


Jump in the Line

by Rinkafic



Series: Jump 'verse [1]
Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M, Stargate Atlantis AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-24
Updated: 2011-09-24
Packaged: 2017-10-24 00:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/256678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinkafic/pseuds/Rinkafic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if the Ori never came?  What if Jack and Sam didn’t have to deal with frat regs anymore?  What if things had gone differently and a different team of people had gone to Atlantis?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jump in the Line

**Author's Note:**

> I could not, could not, could not have done this without my betas, Sandy, Lori and Caitriona. I love them. My cheerleaders too, for cheering me on, camshaft22 and clwilson2006 and everyone who had to listen to my whining and summoning and berating the muses for abandoning me in my hour of need.
> 
> Awesome banner by clwilson2006

  
[   
](http://pics.livejournal.com/rinkafic/pic/002xe2e3/)   


“I’m afraid I cannot accept this, Colonel.” George Hammond slid the envelope back across the desk, unopened.

Jack grit his teeth and silently cursed Daniel for being an interfering tattletale busybody, which is probably what got Daniel’s ass booted out of the Ascended Cool Kid’s Club. This was the last time he was telling Daniel his plans. Well, it probably wasn’t - he was one of Jack’s best friends, after all - but this week, he wasn’t telling him anything.

“You didn’t even read it, sir.” Jack had fallen into parade rest, otherwise he would have been likely to stomp his foot or something equally childish.

“Jack,” Hammond shook his head in disapproval, putting his personal stamp on the request just with that look and the way he drawled Jack’s name.

“Oh, come on, General. Haven’t I done enough? Let me go now, while I still have enough life left in this body to enjoy retirement. The Gou’ald are gone; the replicators are finished. Let me go before some other big bad wolf comes along to keep me here in the fight. I’m tired,” he knew he was pleading, but this was Hammond, one of the few men Jack respected enough to share complete honesty. “They took my team, George.” He gripped the back of the chair across from Hammond’s desk, leaning heavily upon it.

With a sympathetic look, Hammond sat back and twirled his pen between his fingers. “I signed that order, Jack.”

With a wave of his hand, Jack granted the General absolution. “I know it wasn’t you, or at least all of your doing. Those IOA assholes are pushing their agenda on us, which is just one more reason for me to get the hell out of Dodge. I don’t play well with others; you know that.”

Hammond reached over and picked up the envelope containing Jack’s resignation. He held it out to Jack. “Give me a week. If the situation is still intolerable after some changes go into effect, resubmit that, and I will accept it.”

Staring at the envelope, Jack shook his head. “My feelings for her won’t change in a week.”

“No, but other circumstances might. I need you in position, O’Neill. Please, one week.”

If it had been anyone else, Jack would have refused. He took the envelope back and gave Hammond a stiff nod. He left the office before he could say anything else to make matters worse.

~*~

“I wish you’d come down here and at least look, Jack.” Daniel’s voice was tinny and distant over the phone.

“Too friggin’ cold, Danny-boy. Been there, done that. My knee does not like that base. Give me the edited highlights.” The SGC phones were as secure as any line could be, but security was security. Jack really didn’t want to drag his ass down to Antarctica. “Besides, I’m going out to the nice warm secret base in the desert to visit my other best friend and look at her project.”

“You always liked her better,” Daniel complained with a smile apparent in his voice. “We’ve found the address. Our assumptions were wrong, but we figured it out now.” Daniel was excited, and Jack was glad for his friend. At least his new assignment on the Atlantis Project was making someone out of the former SG-1 happy. He wondered how Teal’c was doing with the Jaffa council.

He tried to keep his tone causal as he forced his attention back to Daniel. “So, you’ll be going?”

“There’s a problem. It will drain the battery.”

“Then you’re not going.” There was no way the approval would be given to drain the Earth’s only ZPM for one mission. Not even for Atlantis.

Daniel didn’t say anything, which meant all his arguments were too sensitive to have over the phone. After a long pause, Daniel sighed heavily. “Come and talk to Doctor Weir, Jack.”

“I don’t particularly like talking to Doctor Weir, Daniel. She does that whole ‘twist your words around’ thing and gets me to do things I do not approve of doing.”

“Could you sign off on this project?” Daniel asked hopefully.

He rolled his eyes. “Because you ran telling tales to Hammond, yes, I could if I wanted to, at least for the next week.”

Daniel laughed lightly, not the least bit perturbed by Jack’s accusation, because it was completely true. “He refused to accept your little letter, didn’t he?”

“Shut up. Don’t rub it in, you pest.”

“Think about letting us go, Jack.”

“I haven’t been thinking of anything else but that, Daniel. I gotta go. You stay warm down there. Don’t go freezing your nuts off.”

“Bye, Jack.”

~*~

The day after O’Neill attempted to resign, he was shuffling the papers on his desk in preparation for taking two days to go over to Area 51 and do a review of the projects there. There was a knock on his office door. He glanced up to see Major Davis smiling at him.

“Davis, hello. What’s up?”

“I’m making a delivery, Colonel,” he stepped into the office and extended an envelope to Jack. He stood at attention, as always - the perfect Air Force officer. Did the man sleep in his Class A’s? Jack had never seen him in anything else.

He took the envelope and slit it open with his Bart Simpson letter opener that Teal’c had given him for Christmas three years ago. For some reason, it had greatly amused Teal’c; the big guy had even smiled! He slid the folded paper out and opened it. “By order of the Secretary of the Air Force…”

“Holy crap,” Jack expelled a breath and sat down hard in his chair. He looked up to see Davis watching him, no expression on his face, but a glint of amusement in his eyes. He reached into his pocket and withdrew a small box, holding it out across the desk to Jack.

“Congratulations, sir. A promotion ceremony was planned, but General Hammond bumped up the agenda. My office will be in touch to coordinate something more in keeping with the occasion.”

Opening the box, Jack stared at the single star within. “Nah, this is good Davis. I’m not one for all the pomp and circumstance.”

“Understood, General. May I extend my personal congratulations, sir?”

“Thanks, Davis.” Realizing that he was not going to leave until Jack sent him away; he gave the man a smile and said, “Dismissed, Major.”

He sat and stared at the letter for a while. Hammond had said circumstances were going to change. But this just tied him in more. How could he leave now?

His phone rang. He considered ignoring it, but picked it up. “O’Neill.”

“I heard you had a visitor,” Sam’s voice calmed him, as always. A few words from her and things didn’t seem quite as horrible as they were.

Stroking his finger across the gold star, he wrinkled his nose in suspicion. “Did you know about this?”

“I might have been consulted about plans for a dinner.”

“You could have warned me, Carter.”

“That would have been telling. Congratulations, sir.”

He missed her. This would have been so much sweeter if she’d been here instead of at Area 51. Damn it, she belonged here. His team all belonged here. How was he going to do this without them, without Carter? “Thank you. How’s things in the desert?”

“Oh, plodding along. That idiot Kavanagh almost killed us all again this morning, moving ahead without proper safety protocols in place, so par for the course. You haven’t read your email yet, have you, sir?”

“I was just going to do that when the Promotion Fairy came.” Jack gave his computer a dirty look; the things were a necessary evil in this day and age. “I’m heading up your way; you want me to come down hard on that idiot for you? I can be mean and scary.”

She gave a tittering laugh, her nervous laugh. He wondered what was in the email and booted up his computer. “Won’t be necessary, I threatened to send him to Antarctica to work for Rodney McKay. I think he wet himself.”

His computer was taking forever to start up. Sam was definitely nervous; and her voice was a little tight as she said, “Well, I have to go; I just wanted to say congratulations, sir. I’ll see you when you get here, maybe we can have dinner?”

“Dinner would be great, Carter. I’ll see you later.”

He logged into the base net and went to his email. Scrolling down the inbox, he skipped the seventeen emails from Daniel marked _‘Urgent Read Me Now!’_ until he found the single email from Samantha. It said simply, _“Sir, I thought you should be copied in on this, Carter.”_

He was perplexed for a moment until he realized there were two attachments to the email. He opened the first and blinked when he realized the letter he was reading, addressed to General Hammond, was a letter of resignation. “Oh, Sam, you didn’t,” he whispered.

The second attachment was a reply letter to Carter from Hammond, regretfully approving her request.

Stunned, he stared at the screen.

“Damn it, Daniel! You manipulative little buttinsky!” He shut down his computer and stormed out of the office, more intent than ever to get over to Area 51.

~*~

“We’ll be landing in about five minutes, General.”

The pilot’s voice in his headset jolted Jack from his thoughts. He looked over and nodded. “Thanks, Major.”

The flight had been smooth and fairly pleasant. Mitchell, on light duty and recovering from the wounds he’d taken when his F-302 crashed over Antarctica, had been happy to see Jack when he’d arrived at the airfield. The man was still mulling over the choices of assignment he’d been given, one of them possibly taking over SG-1, if the designation was not retired with the official disbanding of the reassigned team members.

The conversation had been interesting, at least. Jack remembered many flights that had been much worse; at least no one was shooting at them.

“See you later, Mitchell,” Jack waved as he walked away from the chopper and joined his escort waiting by the non-descript door of the non-descript building that housed the SGC research facility.

“Did you have an agenda you would care to share, sir? People I can round up for you?”

“Not particularly, Sergeant Markham. I’m here to see Colonel Carter.” Jack glanced around at the boring office the Sergeant was leading him through.

“She is expecting you, sir.”

The path he was led on was so twisting and winding through stairwells and hallways and rooms behind rooms that Jack was certain he was forever lost in the bowels of Area 51. He was never getting out of here without help.

The fresh-faced Sergeant stopped and stood beside a door. “This is the Colonel’s lab, General.”

“Thank you, Markham. Carry on.” Jack pushed open the door and peered in. Carter was bent over a steel work table, her back to the door.

“Anyone could sneak up on you,” Jack drawled, leaning in the doorframe to watch her.

She didn’t turn, continuing to manipulate the device in front of her as she replied, “Not in my lab. You tripped the security monitors when you entered this level.”

With a satisfied pat on the casing of the device, she set it aside and turned around, giving him a very shaky smile. “Hello, Sir.”

“You can drop the sir, Carter. Apparently, you no longer report to me or anyone else in a uniform.” He had spent the time not chatting with Mitchell working out what he was going to say to her.

She shook her head. When had she started growing her hair out? It was longer than he’d ever seen it, almost to her shoulders. “No, I don’t.”

He walked into the room, approaching her slowly. “Why did you do it?” Not what he’s planned to ask, at least not right away. But she had been staring at him, an odd expression on her face, and he blurted out the question.

“My reasons for staying no longer existed.” Her eyes met his as he moved to within arm’s distance of her.

“That was my reason. They wouldn’t let me go when I used it.”

“They need you more where you are. I can still work for the program in a civilian capacity. I’ve been offered a position here, in fact.”

“Don’t take it,” Jack had absolutely no control over his mouth today.

She blinked. “Why? I like it here.”

Moving two steps closer, he stared down into her face. “You hate it here. Don’t make a decision yet.”

He could feel her breath on his chin as she looked up and asked, “Why? What am I waiting for?”

“For things to fall into place,” he gripped her shoulders and pulled her in close, dipping his head down and catching her lips in a fierce, claiming kiss. There was no hesitation in her response. She returned the kiss with equal fervor, throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him even closer.

One of them whimpered. It might have been him, he wasn’t sure. His hands tangled in her hair; and he slanted his mouth over hers, needing this, after being denied for so long, after waiting so very long. This, right now, was the reward for all that waiting. He intended to savor every moment of it, in case it was the only chance he got.

Sam’s tongue slipped between his lips as he opened his mouth further. There was a momentary battle, but he backed down and let her do the exploring first, enjoying the taste of her as her tongue mapped his mouth. He committed that taste to memory, along with the sound of the mewling whine that she let out as she pressed up against him.

He pulled back, his thumbs caressing her cheeks as he held her face in both his hands, framing that sweet little face that he loved more than any other. He would do anything for her, anything she asked. He’d tried to resign, to retire again, so that she’d be out of his chain of command forever. But she’d beat him to it. He stroked the tip of her nose with his thumb and looked down at her thoughtfully. “Why’d you do it?”

“Because I wanted to take a chance on something bigger,” she replied quietly, her eyes never leaving his. “This was the way to have both of the things I wanted, if it worked out.”

“How’s it working out for you, Car… Sam?”

“So far, so good, Jack.” She flashed an elfin grin at him and then pressed her mouth to his.

As she kissed him, Jack had few coherent thoughts. He was amazed that she actually seemed to be in favor of this thing he’d hoped about for so long. All he had were hopes; they had never had a conversation about this.

He broke off the kiss and took a step back, needing to think for a moment and get the lust back under control. “Did you quit for me, Carter?”

“Did you quit for me, Sir?” she threw back at him with a cheeky smile.

“I asked you first.”

~*~

Sam laughed. She could afford to laugh; she had every advantage in the situation. Daniel had called her three days ago in a panic, spilling Jack’s intention to resign and the reason behind the decision. He had wanted to put the ball in her court, let her decide what to do, before Jack went through with anything.

She had been secretly thrilled by the knowledge that he would do this just to have a chance at a possible relationship without endangering her career. But she couldn’t let him do it. Her sense of duty was too great to allow him to step down. The SGC still needed him.

Science was her first love, and the Air Force had allowed her to explore. But she no longer needed to be Colonel Carter to do what needed to be done for Earth. Doctor Carter could work with the SGC and serve just as well. Her father’s recent death had jolted her, made her think about what she was doing with her life. She wanted more. She wanted Jack, and so long as the frat regulations stood between them, that could not be.

Unsure as to what she should do, she had gone to General Hammond and spread her cards on the table, all of them, and asked him for his advice. He thought it over and came to the same conclusion she had. For the benefit of the SGC, it would be best if she resigned, not Jack. General Hammond had told her of Jack’s imminent promotion. He had hinted that he would be retiring soon and that Jack was on the short list to be his successor in charge of the SGC.

Once the papers were filed and the deed was done, she had waited nervously to see how Jack would respond. This was not a bad response, she could work with this.

She lightly sucked on his lower lip as she pulled back. Her hand at the back of his head scratched lightly at the shaved short hair, something her fingers had itched to do every time he had ever walked into a morning meeting with a fresh haircut.

“So, we on for dinner?” Jack asked, has hands sliding down to rest on her hips. His hands felt so right being there, warm through the cotton of her t-shirt.

Deciding to push him, perhaps tease him, she replied provocatively, “Breakfast too, if you want.”

“Oh damn, I want,” he grabbed her and mashed his lips onto hers, grinding against her as he held her and ravaged her mouth.

~*~

After forcing themselves apart and coming to the conclusion that they should finish out the day’s work. Sam walked him through the base, giving him the tour and an overview on the projects being worked on for the SGC. Jack’s hand slid down to take Sam’s at some point and he didn’t let go, not even when the military personnel were around. She wasn’t really a colonel anymore; he could touch her all he wanted.

He met Kavanagh, by accident, and disliked him even before they were introduced. He liked the engineer with the funny accent, Zelinski or something like that, even without taking cues from Sam as she spoke warmly and joked with the fuzzy headed scientist.

Jack ended up doing a little ancient activation for the scientists while he was taking his tour. He suspected Sam had sent word out to each department handling ancient tech to have their toys out and ready in case he was willing to touch them. He was very glad that all the SGC personnel were being tested for the expression of this Ancient gene, or the ATA gene as they were calling it. Some had already been identified, and were down in Antarctica at the base with Daniel and the Atlantis Project. Soon the test would be incorporated into the US military medical screening process for all the branches. Jack hoped they found more people soon; he hated being one of the few with this ability.

“Who do you have playing light switch when I’m not here?” Jack complained after activating a glowing magic football for the delighted Zelinska.

“Sergeant Markham has the gene, though not as strong an expression as yours. He couldn’t get half the things working that you activated today.

“Lucky him. I’m getting a little hungry Carter, how ‘bout we get some dinner?”

She smiled and shook her head at the scientist approaching with yet another deactivated ancient gadget. “Mess Hall here or do you want to head to the main commissary?”

“Town is out?”

“Way out. Twenty-five miles out, and not particularly worth the drive,” Sam replied.

He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed the back of her knuckles. “Then I will owe you a fancy night out for steak and wine.”

“I look forward to collecting. The Little Mess Hall isn’t bad.”

“Lead on. You can’t kill me with mess hall food, you know. I have a tolerance built up.” When she smirked at him, he declared, “I can even eat the meatloaf.”

The comment made her shake her head. “You have a cast iron constitution, sir.”

He tugged her to a stop and edged her back against the wall, out of the way of the light traffic in the corridor. “What did I tell you about the sir, Carter?”

“Habit, Jack. Eight years of calling you ‘sir” is going to take a while to get over. And you have to call me Sam.”

“Point taken.” He leaned down and kissed her, not caring if anyone saw.

“Food,” she said as she pushed him away and took his hand to lead him to the mess hall.

“Could we get it to go?” He leered at her when she glanced over her shoulder at the question. She nodded. She had a mix of curiosity, amusement and desire on her face as the tip of her tongue darted out to lick her lips. He groaned and told her, “Don’t do that again. Not until later, when we’re alone.”

“Do what?”

“The thing, with the tongue.” He demonstrated, which made her giggle, which turned into a snort. She blushed and started giggling again.

“Killing me, Carter.” Seeing her giddy was making Jack equal parts happy and horny. They joined the line for food and picked up trays. He was glad she’d abandoned the lab coat before they started the tour of the base. Scientist Sam, with her white lab coat and glasses and hair pulled back in a messy ponytail was the stuff of his best fantasies.

“You summoned the meatloaf,” Sam intoned, pointing at the line of trays in the steam table.

“Not intentionally.”

She sighed and pointed to the chicken and vegetables in cream sauce. Her face brightened when she saw the dessert offerings for the day. “Oh look! Blue Jell-O.”

“Sometimes you are incomprehensible.”

“Right back at ya, Jack,” she winked and reached up to pinch his cheek. She could do that now; touch him if she wanted to. He liked that. Her plan might have been better than his after all. They could still work together; he could still do what he could to keep her safe. That would still be one of his responsibilities.

“There’s a table,” she pointed, eying the sloppy mess on her tray. “I only have a desk in my quarters, and one chair.”

He headed over to the table and pulled out a chair for her. She smiled at the courtesy and sat as he rounded the table and slid into the chair across from her. They ate in companionable silence, anticipation making the meal different than the hundreds of others they had shared over the years.

Jack finished first, practically inhaling the meatloaf and potatoes. He sat and watched her pick daintily at her chicken before she made a face and pushed it away, abandoning it to tuck into her Jell-O with great enthusiasm. He added Jell-O to his permanent shopping list.

“Ready?” he asked as she licked her spoon clean. She nodded happily and he collected their trays and dropped them at the return.

“Let’s go topside, walk off that meal a little.” He made a fist and bumped the center of his chest with a little grimace.

“Not so cast iron, after all?”

“Maybe just aluminum.”

The sun was already below the horizon and the desert around the base was slowly darkening. Jack took Sam’s hand and led her towards the airstrip. His mind had been in turmoil all day, about things he should have said, things he should say. He’d wondered if this was rushing things, to go back to her quarters now. But over the past few hours, he had rationalized the whole thing in his mind. They had been dancing around this thing, keeping at a distance for eight years. They’d been friends for eight years. It wasn’t really a rush, but rather the longest round of courtship and foreplay he’d ever encountered.

He stopped and turned towards her, the fading light still enough to see by. “So, I wanted to say something. Before anything else happened, I just wanted to say it.”

The little minx looked up at him and stole his line. “I love you.”

“Damn it, Carter! Quit jumping in front of me!” He barked in amused frustration. He cupped her cheeks in his hands and kissed her softly, pouring everything he felt for this woman into the kiss. His lip dragged at hers a little as he pulled back. “I love you, Samantha.”

She leaned in and buried her head against his neck, wrapping her arms around his waist and just holding him. They stayed that way until the light was almost gone and they had to go back inside.

As they walked back, he held her hand, their fingers twined together. “I’m not a young man, Sam.”

“You’re not old, Jack.”

“Old enough. I’m a bit battered, I creak a lot, and everything doesn’t always work properly.”

She squeezed his hand. “And I was well on the way to becoming a crazy cat lady. I snore. I work crazy hours and forget to sleep. I get involved in things and forget to do other things. I’m a horrible girlfriend.”

With a chuckle at her honesty, he stopped walking and reached for her chin, looking down into her face in the light from an overhead security pole light. “Promise me something?”

“Depends what it is. I don’t make promises I can’t keep.”

“Fair enough. Promise me honesty. Full disclosure. I’ll promise you the same. Keeping things secret, bottling things up, lying, those all wrecked my marriage to Sarah. You’re too important to me to mess this up, and I promise I will never lie to you, Sam.”

She went up on her toes and kissed him. “That promise I can keep. I swear, I will never lie to you, Jack.”

“Good. Then we’re good.” He dropped his arm around her shoulders and they walked the rest of the way back to the base.

~*~

“Colonel Carter, good morning!” The cheery little Czech called out as Sam and Jack entered the lab the next morning. Their wake up sex had been interrupted by a call from the lab that some telemetry reports Sam had been waiting for had come in. They had decided to postpone their romp until lunchtime, when they could give it the close attention it deserved.

Sam waved and went to her computer. “Good morning Radek. It’s just Doctor Carter now, my detachment papers came through. Have you heard from the monster this morning?”

He smirked and shook his head. “No, all seems quiet down in underworld, Doctor Carter.” He looked from Jack to Sam with his brow furrowed, and then he smiled broadly and nodded in approval.

“Good. No news is always good news on that front.” She noticed Jack giving them the eye, and translated, “Antarctica; McKay.”

“Ah. You want muffins and coffee?”

She licked her lips and nodded. “You can find your way to the mess?”

“I can always find my way to the mess, love.” He leaned in and kissed her lips.

“Radek, you want muffins and coffee? Sam likes you, so you get fed.”

“Black, with one sugar, please, General. And if you find muffin with fruit in it, would be very good.” The Czech grinned and then bent his head over his computer.

Enjoying his mission as coffee boy, since it required him to put his masterful tracking skills to use to locate the Little Mess Hall, Jack was smiling when he returned to the lab with a tray of coffee and pastries.

“No fruity muffins, will a strawberry Danish do, Radek?” Jack asked as he came through the door.

“Is good, yes, General!” Radek scampered over, retrieved his breakfast and went back to work.

“I like him. Him, you can keep,” Jack whispered to Sam. “That other one, Kavanagh, send to Antarctica. That was a good plan. Let the monster eat him.”

Sam chuckled and sipped at her coffee as she read through emails. “What are you going to do today, Jack?”

“I have a lunch date with this hot doctor I met,” he leered at her and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. “I heard she has a crush on me.”

She rolled her eyes and behind them Zelenka snorted. Jack tossed him a cheery smile. “What ya got for me to turn on today, Radek?”

“General is brave man,” Radek intoned and pointed to a box. “I leave to you to choose. Is mystery box, we have no idea what anything in there does.”

Jack hopped off the stool he’d been perched on and crouched beside the box on the floor. He let his hand hover over the box of jumbled artifacts until one seemed to demand more attention than the others. He picked it up and turned it over in his hands as he stood and walked it over to Zelenka.

“Item 3324, found on M7T-654,” Zelenka read as he checked the tag.

“It’s lonely,” Jack mumbled, staring at the object in his hands.

The typing on the keys stopped, and Sam came over. “What do you mean by that, Jack?”

“I dunno. It feels like it wants to be with others, part of a whole that is separated.” He held it out and turned it over, showing the scientists a groove on the underside. “Something goes here. Right now, it’s incomplete.”

“You get all this from touching object, General?” Zelenka asked. His eyes were wide as he looked from Jack to the object in his hand and back.

Jack nodded and dropped it into Radek’s palm. “Yup, freaky, isn’t it?”

“Doctor Carter, please, may we keep him?” Zelenka asked Sam, and he was more than half serious.

Cuffing O’Neill lightly upside the head, Sam warned him, “Now Jack, stop saying things like that to my scientists or everyone is gonna want a Jack of their own.”

"Only one me. Oh, wait, scratch that, if they can find the other one, they can have him," he joked, thinking briefly about the young clone they had set loose on the unsuspecting world.

Jack spent the morning in the lab, making notes on impressions he got off objects and talking hockey with Zelenka. Sam worked on her telemetry project, which Jack knew was code for something else. He didn’t bother asking about it, if he needed to know, she’d tell him. If he really needed to know, she’d make a Power Point presentation and show him.

Sergeant Markham skidded into the lab just before they were going to break for lunch, clearly out of breath after running. “General, Colonel, you’re needed in communications immediately. General Hammond is on video call.”

They jogged up the four levels and over half the building to get to the communications center. Jack moved in front of the screen and saw that Hammond’s expression was grim. “General Hammond, by your expression, it doesn’t seem like a very good morning, sir.”

“No Jack, I’m afraid it isn’t. Hello, Doctor Carter. There’s been a mishap down at the base in Antarctica. We’ve got heavy casualties.”

“What kind of mishap?” Jack had a bad feeling, a sick churning in the pit of his stomach. Hammond making this call himself was a sign.

Hammond looked over at Harriman, just visible in the corner of the screen. “At eleven fifteen this morning, a drone misfired inside the base. The reports from survivors say it ricocheted around, causing heavy damage to the internal systems and setting off a chain reaction in the heating system that caused several explosions.”

“Survivors,” Jack fixated on that word, that word was bad; survivors meant there were others that didn’t make it. “Daniel?”

Hammond’s lips were tight as he looked at them over the camera. “Doctor Jackson is still among the missing. I need you and Col… Doctor Carter and that Ancient artifacts expert you’ve got over there to get down to the base and salvage anything you can. There’s a pilot from McMurdo coordinating the Search and Rescue; see him when you get on site, a Major Sheppard.”

“Understood, sir. We’ll be in touch.”

Jack looked at Sam, certain that he looked as worried as she did. He cursed the fates if this was the tradeoff for their happiness, if they’d been given each other and had Daniel taken from them. “Quickest way to the pole?”

“We’ve got a few functioning F-302s, but I’m not qualified to pilot, there’s no one here aside from you that can. And we need to take Zelenka.”

“Wrong. I brought my own pilot, though I didn’t know I’d need him this much. That is, if he’s willing to climb back into the saddle.” At Sam’s blank look, he said, “Cameron Mitchell is on site.”

Sam gave a curt nod. “I’ll get Zelenka, you go find Cam.”

Jack watched her go and looked around for his guide dog to lead him to the surface. “Markham! Hey, Markham, where’d you get to?”

With Markham’s help, he found Mitchell clad in a jumpsuit, tinkering with the engine of a Huey. “Mitchell!” Jack called as he strode over. He was thinking it might have been better for him to have gone after the geek and let Sam handle this one; she and Mitchell had gone to the Academy together and were good friends. This might take some friendly persuasion.

“General. You ready to leave?”

“Yes, but not the way we came. We have a situation. You think you can handle a 302?”

Mitchell looked a little surprised by the question. His squadron of ‘snakeskinners’ had been disbanded after the battle that had almost killed him. After a moment’s thought Cameron said, “I know I can handle one, sir.”

“Not afraid to jump back in the saddle?”

Mitchell waved off the concern. “Nah.”

“We’ve gotta go to Antarctica, now.”

Cam nodded and wiped his hands on his jumpsuit. “I’ll just get my gear, sir.”

Within an hour they were on the tarmac, staring at the hybrid alien-human fighter planes as the crews prepared them for use. “Didn’t think I’d be seeing one of those again,” Mitchell murmured as he crossed his arms and tapped his foot.

Sam noticed his unease and reached over to squeeze his arm. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”

As Jack came over wearing a borrowed flight suit, Sam announced, “I’ll go with Cam. Radek has met you Jack; he’ll be more comfortable flying with someone he knows.”

If Jack understood what was going on, he was wise enough not to embarrass Mitchell and say anything about it. Sam wasn’t qualified on record to pilot the F-302, but she had helped in the original designing of the damn things and could certainly take over if Mitchell freaked out up there. If Zelenka was in the co-pilot’s seat, he might not be able to handle things if they went upside down.

The concerns were unnecessary; they had no issues and made it to the Antarctica base in a fraction of the time it would have taken by conventional means.

They set down in a landing zone marked off with yellow tape, bright against the white snow. The site was a disaster, with smoke billowing from a hole in the ground that marked the partially collapsed base.

After exiting the 302’s, they pulled on the parkas and winter gear they had brought and waited for the person that jogged across the ice-packed snow to meet them.

“Is one of you General O’Neill?” the person asked, shielding their eyes against the glare coming off the snow.

“Yeah, that’s me.”

“I’m Lieutenant Cadman, sir, US Marine Corps. I’m supposed to take you to Major Sheppard.”

They followed the Lieutenant across the snow to a Quonset hut set up not far from the makeshift landing field. As they entered and wove through the crates of supplies and equipment, a dark haired man was drawling into a field telephone, “I understand that, sir, but there are only two pilots available to make the run. Please tell the doctor we’re shuttling as quickly as we can.” He rolled his eyes at the phone and waved them in. “Yes, I’ll have a full report ready when I return, sir. I’ll do that, sr.” He slammed the receiver down into the base unit and turned at their approach.

“General O’Neill? I’m John Sheppard.”

“That’s me,” Jack introduced the others as he shook Sheppard’s hand. “These are Doctors Carter and Zelenka and Major Mitchell. What’s the situation, Major?”

“Well, we’ve been pulling people out as quickly as we can get to them. We’ve got two other buildings like this one set up with heat, and a third without heat as a makeshift morgue. We’ve got the medics triaging the worst cases and we’re shuttling them to the hospital at McMurdo as quickly as we can.”

“From that conversation, you’ve only got two chopper pilots,” Jack pointed at the phone.

Frustration was evident in the man’s face as he replied, “Yes, sir, Captain Wils and myself.”

“Well, now you have three,” Mitchell volunteered with a small smile as Sheppard looked over at him gratefully.

“Good, thanks, Major. You can come back with me as soon as they finish securing the last of this group, and we can bring an extra bird back.”

O’Neill had gone to the door and peeked out. “What can you tell us about the accident, Sheppard?”

“Not much, sr. I’ve been spending my time running back and forth. I only know what I’ve picked up in transit. Cadman was down there, she can probably give you a better idea - if you can nail her feet to the floor long enough.”

Walking up behind Jack, Sam peered over his shoulder at the smoke pouring from the top secret facility. She turned back to Sheppard. “Do you know if they found Doctor Daniel Jackson?”

“I know that they found a few Doctors. Why don’t I take you to where the walking wounded are, let you get some better intel from the folks that were down there? My passenger should be just about secured; I just came over here to take that call from my CO.”

That statement, and the way Sheppard casually tossed it out, gave him the impression that the guy running McMurdo was of the sort that probably caused more problems in a chain of command than he solved.

They followed Sheppard out into the cold to another hut. He waved them in, and then said, “I’m gonna head out. I’ll be back in a while, coming, Mitchell?”

Sam pushed the hood back off her head and made her way through the cots set up around the building. The frozen ground was deadly cold to sit on directly, so every piece of furniture, crate or equipment that could support a body’s weight was being used for support. Sam couldn’t help glancing into every face she passed, hoping to find those she knew, alive.

“Colonel Carter?” a small voice called out and she turned to see the diminutive Japanese scientist Miko Kusanagi waving at her.

Radek expelled a breath as he too caught sight of their colleague. They hustled over to the crate where she was perched. She had a patch over one eye, and her arm was in a sling. “Miko, what happened?” Sam and Radek asked in unison.

“I was working on dialing sequence program. There was great noise, and then alarms began to buzz. There was great confusion. People began to run. Military men began to shout to evacuate. I did not run fast enough. Something hit my face. I fell and broke my arm. A military man picked me up and carried me to long ladder. He carried me up like baby monkey,” she blushed as she mimed how she had held on with one arm and her legs.

As Sam touched her good arm and gave a squeeze of encouragement, Miko continued, “Not long after we come outside, there was another loud explosion, and the ground shook, and began to cave in. Not many people came out after that.”

Zelenka was now patting her good arm, rubbing her back in a conciliatory manner. She gave a sob and buried her face against his chest. He carefully held her and whispered soothing words to her in Czech as she sobbed quietly.

After listening to the Japanese scientist’s report, Jack had looked around for a soldier he could browbeat, but found none. “Where are all the military?” he called to the room in general.

“Most of them are in the other two huts, sir,” a man sitting atop a generator called out. “A lot of the marines didn’t make it out. Those that did went back in to dig out the survivors.”

Jack nodded his thanks and then left the hut. Daniel wasn’t there. Maybe he was in the other hut. A familiar, petite, bundled-up form jogged past him and Jack shouted, “Lieutenant Cadman!” She stopped and turned towards him. He wondered what she looked like under the goggles and scarf and parka.

“Yes, sir?”

“I need a situation report, Cadman.”

“I was just going to find more bandages for Triage One, sir.” She waved over her shoulder with a mittened hand. It might have been a wave. In her heavy parka it was more like a flipper flutter.

Jack gestured in the direction she had been heading. “I’ll walk with you.”

She flapped her arms and turned and set off again. He followed her to another hut. She pushed open the door, and he saw that this was where the salvaged supplies were being kept. The supplies and the dead. He stopped inside the door and took a deep breath.

She pushed the wide iridescent goggles up off her face and turned to him. “I should get the bandages back soon, sir. I’m one of the few that’s mobile enough to move between buildings.” She went to a crate and flipped open the latches.

“How many more are down there, Cadman?”

“Best guess is eleven, last I heard sir. We’re still trying to get to the antechamber where the main SitOp was and into the chair room. They were both blocked off by the collapse, although the readings show pockets of open air and a few heat signatures that indicate life signs.”

“Do we have names for any of those still down there?”

“The CSO, for certain, Doctor McKay was in the chair room; reports say the CMO - Doctor Beckett - was in the chair. The marines are digging there now; there are two life signs and a fairly large air pocket in the vicinity of the chair room.” She dug around in the box and began shoving packets into bags slung around her neck and across her chest. “There had been a meeting scheduled for 1100 in the SitOp. Colonel Sumner, Doctor Weir, Doctor Valez and Doctor Jackson were all supposed to be in that meeting, along with several other scientists. There is only one life sign in the area where the SitOp was. There’s a team digging to get to it.”

Shaken by the possibility that there was only a slim chance that Daniel was that one life sign, Jack gulped and forced a stoic expression onto his face. “Thank you, Lieutenant. Do you know what caused the accident?”

She closed the case and turned back to him. “A drone, sir. It was shooting around the base uncontrolled. It cut through walls, took out support beams, crashed a few critical systems and then exploded when it hit the main power grid. Those marines are down there digging in the dark by flashlight.”

“Not for long, Lieutenant. Carter will work something out.”

~*~

Sam listened to Jack’s rendition of what Cadman had told him and wanted to cry. Those were friends and colleagues down there. But she steeled her spine and set about doing what she could to help. She and Zelenka foraged through the equipment sheds and managed to rig up a rough lighting system for the marines down in the pit. Not having to work by flashlight made the rescue effort go much faster. They pulled more survivors out and sent them to McMurdo.

For close to an hour, Sheppard, Mitchell and Captain Wils ferried the wounded to McMurdo. Every capable hand was needed to help with the digging, so when they had the worst cases shifted, Sheppard and Mitchell joined the effort to free the people trapped below. They left Captain Wils to shuttle the walking wounded to the other base.

O’Neill and Mitchell went to help dig to the SitOP, while Carter and Sheppard stayed with the team working on getting to McKay and Beckett in the chair room. They broke through to the air pocket about an hour after Sam’s arrival at the base.

Sam shouted through the hole as Sheppard and the two marines continued to dig away the ice to make an opening wide enough to send someone through. “McKay! Rodney McKay, can you hear me?”

“Carter? What are you doing here?”

“Rescuing your ass, are you hurt?”

“Well, yeah! I’ve got massive internal injuries, I’m sure. I’m pinned down under the chair and part of the ceiling. I can’t move, and I can’t feel my legs.”

“Hang on, we’re coming. We’ve almost got the way cleared enough to get through to you. Is Doctor Beckett with you?”

It took a little while for Rodney to answer. “Yeah. He’s still in the chair, I think. He’s got a pulse. I can’t see anything, it is too dark. He’s sticky, everything is sticky. I think it might be blood.”

“We’re through!” one of the marines at the front of the dig cried out. They dragged the light string along through the small tunnel to the remnants of the chair room.

“Stay here, Doctor Carter, I’ll check it out,” Sheppard grabbed her arm and dragged her back as she moved to follow the first marine through the hole. She almost protested his grabbiness when she realized he had been introduced to her as a scientist, and he had no idea that until yesterday, she had outranked him.

She waited impatiently until Sheppard yelled, “All clear, Doc, c’mon through.”

Sam ducked her head and crawled through the narrow passage with the other marine at her back. She stood as soon as she had the head room to do so and gasped at the sight around her; at the ruins of the room she had known when it was intact and working. There was a heap of debris in the middle of the chamber; the ceiling had come down over the chair.

Pointing to where it had been, Carter said, “The chair was over there.” They quickly got to work pulling the wreckage away.

A loud groan caught their attention as she and Sheppard worked together to shift a large piece of ceiling beam, each of them taking an end and heaving it aside. Sheppard lifted a piece of plywood and tossed it away. He called out, “Over here!”

“McKay!” Sam moved to crouch beside his head as the others worked slowly and carefully moving debris, knowing that Beckett had to be nearby. Rodney was on his stomach. Sam could only see about half of his back. The rest of his body was still under the debris pile.

McKay’s eyes fluttered open, and he gave her a feeble smile. “Hi, Sam!”

“Hi Rodney. You were a little late with your morning report, so I came to collect it in person.”

“Glad you did. We’re having a little trouble with the server. Maybe you could look into it?” He coughed feebly, spitting up a bit of blood.

She ran her fingers over his head and neck, feeling for injuries. “I brought Zelenka; he’ll have you up and running in no time.”

“Little Czech bastard. You always liked him better than me.” He coughed, again bringing up blood.

The others had almost gotten to Beckett. She heard Sheppard warning them to go easy because he saw blood. Trying to keep McKay distracted, as she knew how he could be when he panicked, she forced cheerfulness as she said, “Oh, Rodney, you know that’s not true. You know my heart belongs to Kavanagh. He’s the one I’m destined to run off and have a torrid affair with!”

“You hussy!” McKay grimaced as the marines shifted something large. “Ow, damn, ow, that hurt.”

Sam stood and helped them shift some more plywood ceiling panels. The chair was a little twisted but still intact, lying on its side, pinning McKay’s legs. Beckett had spilled out of it, landing partially atop Rodney. Sam didn’t tell McKay, but the sticky pooled blood he had felt was his own. Beckett seemed to be okay, with no apparent injuries. He was just unconscious. Rodney’s legs and back were torn up.

“Let’s get this thing off him,” Sheppard said after they had strapped Beckett to a backboard and sent him off to the surface to be taken to McMurdo. He put his hands on the back of the chair, intending to shove it aside, and gasped as the entire thing flickered with a blue light for a few seconds before going dark and cold again.

Sam noticed the chair’s behavior and snapped, “Major, we do not have time to discuss it now, but you are to report to General O’Neill and tell him I said you probably have the ATA gene. Got that?”

He gave her a confused look, but obviously recognized an order when he heard it, so Sheppard nodded. With the help of the marines he lifted the chair up and off McKay, dragging wires and bits of circuitry with them as they moved it.

“What happened? Who ATA?” McKay mumbled.

Sam patted his cheek. “Never mind Rodney, I’ll tell you later if it all works out. Can you feel your legs?”

“No. Did you get the roof off them yet?”

They had, and that was why she was concerned. She had hoped he wasn’t feeling things due to compression on his spine. Now she feared he might have a more serious spinal injury. “Almost. We’re just waiting for a backboard so we can get you out of her,” she tried to keep her tone hopeful.

She met Sheppard’s eyes as he carried the backboard in, and he glanced down at McKay’s obviously broken body. He shook his head with pity as he knelt beside her, and they worked to get McKay as secure as they could in order to move him.

~*~

Jack had his fingers crossed as they broke through to the second air pocket near the conference room area. They had found three bodies in the first pocket; Colonel Marshall Sumner, Doctor Valez and a scientist named Henson. Sadly and reverently, after observing a moment of respectful silence, the marines had placed their commanding officer in a black body bag and carried him away. Jack tried hard not to be quite so grateful that Daniel wasn’t being taken away in one of those bags.

“We’ve got another body, sir,” the marine called from the hole. “It’s Lieutenant Ford.”

There was a hush as the marines bowed their heads momentarily in respect. Then they were in motion again, they had a heat signature on the other side of that cave in. Someone was still alive and needed their help.

Jack switched places with Mitchell to dig for a little while in the cramped area they were tunneling out. His shovel suddenly went forward, and he lost his balance. Mitchell caught the back of his coat and kept him from tumbling over as a mini avalanche started.

“I think we hit the next pocket!” Mitchell shouted over his shoulder as Jack regained his balance.

Jack pulled out his flashlight and scrambled to the hole to shine it through. Someone was huddled beneath what looked to be the remnants of the conference table. “Hey! Hey, look at me!” Jack called.

The face that tilted up towards him was covered in blood and soot, but the wide blue eyes were not Daniel’s. Jack choked down his disappointment and asked the man, “What’s your name?” The guy had to be in shock; he was trembling as he sat there with his arms locked around his knees.

“Hey, I’m Jack, we’re gonna have you out of there in a few minutes. Are you hurt?”

“I’m cold. I hit my head,” the man said slowly as he fluttered a hand at the gash over his ear.

The Marines were digging beside him, trying to clear the passage as Jack talked to the man. Jack shone the light around and spotted a pale slim hand protruding from a snow drift. Another corpse, he quickly shined the light away so that the man didn’t see the hand. “I can see that. You’ve got a bit of blood on you. What’s your name, guy?”

“Parrish.”

Jack turned to Mitchell standing behind him and said quietly, “Parrish.”

With a nod, Mitchell pulled a list out of his pocket and scanned down it. “Botanist. Doctor David Parrish.”

“We’re almost through to you, David; it must suck for someone used to greenhouses to be stuck with all this snow.”

Parrish nodded dully, his eyes unfocused, his movements jerky. “I’m cold.”

“Soon as we get to you, we’ve got a warm parka and some hot tea for you.”

“Tea would be nice.”

They broke through soon after, and Parrish was wrapped up snugly and taken above to be checked over by one of the doctors that had arrived to help with the wounded. Jack had been certain he’d heard the commanding tones of Carolyn Lam over the radio at one point. Jack patted Parrish’s shoulder as he was carried past him by the rescue workers. “You’ll be okay, Parrish.”

The marines were carefully digging out the body that was in the pocket where they had found Parrish. Jack wondered if the scientist had known he was only two feet away from the corpse of one of his coworkers. Being trapped in the dark had probably been a blessing in this case.

“We’ve found Doctor Weir,” one of the marines called.

“Damn it. I was hoping she was in one of the other pockets,” Jack swore, running a hand over his face. He looked up at Mitchell. “How many are left unaccounted for?”

Mitchell looked over the list in his hand. “Seven, sir. The other bodies have been recovered.”

“How many heat signatures left?” Jack asked him, dreading the answer.

“Two, sir.”

Wearily, Jack climbed to his feet and slapped Mitchell’s arm. “Let’s go see if we can be of any help somewhere else.” He was tired, but he couldn’t rest until he knew what had happened to Daniel.

~*~

According to the plan of the base, the area where this heat signature they were tracking showed up was a corridor leading to a large storage room. Sam wiped the sweat off her forehead with the sleeve of her coat. She, Sheppard and the marine that had stayed with them after they sent McKay topside were trading off digging in the corridor in which they had found themselves. It was too narrow to work side by side and swing the shovel.

“My turn, Doc,” Sergeant Stackhouse said, holding a hand out for the shovel. She handed it over and stood back, leaning against the wall to rest beside Sheppard.

“So, how’d you get banished to the back of beyond, Major?” she asked conversationally as she took a swig from her water bottle.

He tilted his head and gave her a smile. “The real reason or the one that’s on the books?”

“Either one.”

“Pissed off the wrong people, disobeyed an order.”

“And the real reason?”

He smirked at her and whispered, “Pissed off the wrong people, and you’re not supposed to ask.”

She smiled back at him in understanding, “Gotcha.”

“You’re not like any Doctor I know; I’d swear you were military.”

“I was, until noon yesterday when my discharge became official. Colonel Samantha Carter.”

He smiled smugly. “Knew it.”

Stackhouse called, “I think I hit a wall or a door or something.” He batted the shovel in the area where the doorknob should be and the metal hit and clanged. “Door!” Stackhouse shouted.

There was suddenly an answering pounding and muffled shouting from the other side of the door.

Leaning close, Stackhouse pounded on it and shouted, “Hang on, we’re coming.” He used the shovel to clear the rest of the snow away and then dragged it outwards.

Two forms stumbled through and fell onto the snow-covered floor at the feet of their rescuers. Sheppard reached to help the woman up while Sam threw her arms around Daniel’s neck with a cry of joy as he sat up. She ended up across his lap, laughing with relief as she rained kisses on his face.

“Daniel, we thought you were dead.”

“So I see. I’m not. Doctor Biro and I were on the way back to the meeting with some charts when the ceiling collapsed.”

Sheppard held a hand out to drag Sam off Daniel’s lap, and then helped Daniel to stand as well. “Thanks, Sheppard,” Daniel said, reading his name off his flight jacket.

“My pleasure. Glad to find you both alive, Doctors.”

~*~

O’Neill and Mitchell were heading over to help dig out the next survivor when Sam came around a corner and ran straight into Jack. “Hey, easy, killer,” he kissed her forehead, “You okay?”

“So, like that now, is it?” Daniel asked from behind Sam.

Jack spared a glance heavenward and then reached around Sam to pull Daniel roughly into his arms. “You have got to stop scaring years off my life, Daniel. Please.”

“Glad to see you too, Jack,” Daniel replied, flailing his arms helplessly as his friend attempted to squeeze the stuffing out of him.

“SG-1,” Mitchell said with a smile to Sheppard by way of explanation. Sheppard nodded, not understanding what that meant but unwilling to admit to it.

The radio Mitchell had clipped to his shoulder crackled, and another search team reported that the last survivor had been located. This had now become a recovery mission for the last four bodies.

“We should get the marines topside, let them rest. They can bring in dogs to try to find the others,” Jack said wearily.

~*~

As they stomped towards the helicopter to ride over to McMurdo for the night, Sheppard jogged to catch up to O’Neill. “General, the Doc said I was supposed to tell you that she thinks I have something she called an ATA gene.”

Jack looked at the scruffy major and asked, “And what makes her say that?”

“I touched the chair, and it kinda went all blue before it fizzled off.”

“So, how do you like McMurdo?” Jack asked in response.

Sheppard shrugged. “I like flying. I get to do a lot of that out here, gives me time to think.”

“Think about what?”

“Stuff.”

This one was a scintillating conversationalist, Jack thought. Or he was hiding things. “Ever want to do more?”

“Than fly? Not really. Not anymore.”

Looking over his shoulder Jack called out, “Hey, Mitchell, you okay to run my girl and the others over to McMurdo?”

Mitchell waved. “Sure thing, General.”

When Jack took Sheppard’s sleeve and dragged him off in the opposite direction from their ride, Sam called out, “Where are you going, Jack?”

“A little recruitment booster, see you later.”

Jack took Sheppard over to where the F-302’s were parked, away from the area where the helicopters had been landing all day. It was the first time Sheppard had seen the hybrids.

His jaw dropped a little as they walked closer. “What are they?”

“Called an F-302, a hybrid of several technologies. Hop on up.” Jack climbed the footholds and swung himself into the cockpit. Sheppard scrambled up eagerly behind him and dropped into the rear seat, looking everywhere at once.

A few minutes later, they were in the air, swooping over the open expanse of snow. Jack took the opportunity to do an aerial recon of the ruined base. He shook his head sadly as he looked over the smoking ruins of the secret base. “I think this puppy is a wash.”

“Yeah, not much left to salvage,” Sheppard agreed over the helmet coms.

Jack took the F-302 through her paces, showing off a little for his passenger. They flew past McMurdo, which caused Sheppard to blurt out, “Oh my God, how fast are we going?”

The General’s response was to ask, “So, Sheppard, did you ever want to be an astronaut when you were a kid?”

“Who didn’t, sir? I always wanted to see Earth from space. One of the reasons I joined the Air Force, but I couldn’t get into NASA.”

Smiling, Jack whistled a little tune. “Ah, who needs NASA?” He banked the F-302 and then headed up. He hit the thrusters, and soon they were crossing into the upper atmosphere. He spun her around, and they were looking at Earth hanging before them on a black, star speckled background.

“Oh, wow,” Sheppard breathed huskily into the mic.

“Wanna come work for me, Sheppard?”

Sheppard snorted derisively, “With my record?”

“I have a soft spot for misfits and troublemakers. And you’ve got something I need. That ATA gene of yours makes you a very valuable commodity.”

“I could fly one of these?”

Jack had him; he could hear the longing in the pilot’s voice. “And more.”

“I guess if the Air Force approves it, I’d like to do that, sir. I would very much like to do that.”

~*~

After parking the F-302 back near the base, Jack and Sheppard flew by chopper to McMurdo.

Jack got the opportunity to meet the asshole in charge.

He then took the opportunity to throw his new rank around a little and do an on the spot transfer of one Major John Sheppard to the SGC, effective immediately. The fish faces the man made at Jack made it all worthwhile.

Jack stomped into the mess hall after his altercation with the CO to find Sam, Radek, the little Japanese scientist, Mitchell, Daniel and Sheppard clustered around a table. Jack clapped his hands and eyed the various trays. “So, kids, what’s good to eat?”

“The mac and cheese is passable,” Sheppard replied, digging into his plate. Mitchell, spooning up the same, nodded.

“Avoid lentils,” Radek advised, pointing to the abandoned pile on the corner of his tray and making a face. “Even bar-be-cue sauce does not hide bad flavor.”

With a shake of his head, Jack replied sagely, “It is always wise to avoid the lentils.”

Sam and Daniel looked at each other and then at Jack and said together, “Meatloaf.” Jack smiled and went off to gather his plate.

“You do not even have meatloaf,” Radek said in confusion as he looked at the chicken Sam and Daniel were both eating.

“Jack always likes the meatloaf,” Daniel replied, and Sam agreed, nodding her head.

When Jack returned, Sam slid over a little and Jack squeezed between her and Radek, dropping his tray of meatloaf with a side of mac and cheese on the table.

“I can’t believe he actually likes the meatloaf,” Sheppard remarked to Mitchell. “No one likes the meatloaf.”

The conversation at the table was hushed and somber after that, as they remembered the reason they were there and the people that had been lost that morning.

Finished with his meal, Daniel looked over at Jack and said, “So, is the project dead?”

“I don’t know, Daniel. We retrieved the ZPM. I guess it depends on whether the chair can be salvaged and the ammo shifted to a new location. If that can happen, then we’re back to the whole question of draining the ZPM. If it can’t happen, the mission is much more likely to get a green light. Without Weir spearheading the push, and with the loss of so many of the international scientists on the team, it might not happen.”

When Miko yawned, it started a chain reaction. Jack stood up and collected his and Sam’s trays, and then picked up Daniel’s as well and dropped them all at the cleaning station. “C’mon sleepyhead.” He patted Sam’s shoulder as he walked by.

Before he walked too far, Jack turned and called back, “Sheppard, you’ve been transferred to Colorado Springs. Pack your gear; you leave in the morning with the rest of the SGC staff being flown out.” He smiled as Sheppard blinked in surprise and his jaw dropped. Watching the exchange, Mitchell burst out laughing.

“Thank you, sir!” Sheppard called after him.

~*~

Jack and Sam walked Daniel to the room he was sharing with Zelenka. “So, it’s really like that, then?” Daniel pointed a finger back and forth between them.

“Yes, you troublemaking yenta, go to bed, and dream of other matches you must make,” Jack teased and punched Daniel’s shoulder affectionately.

Daniel rubbed his chin thoughtfully and affected a Yiddish accent, “I don’t know, maybe. I’ve seen one or two possibilities lately, I shall think upon this. Goodnight.”

 

They had been assigned a VIP room, due to Jack’s rank. Mumbling about how glad she was that she had showered before dinner, Sam crawled across the bed and face planted on the bed as Jack went off to take a shower. By the time he returned, she was snoring into the pillow. Concerned that she was going to smother like that, Jack gently turned her head. She murmured something in her sleep and snorted. He chuckled, surprised that he found it cute.

He undressed her and pulled the blankets up over them both as he curled himself around her. He quickly followed her into sleep.

 

Sam woke up, cold along one side and confused as to where she was. The answers came in a rush as Jack snorted in her ear; he was the warmth along one side, the other was exposed to the chilly air of their temporary quarters at McMurdo.

So many people she knew were dead. Scientists she had worked with over the years on various projects. Brilliant minds, snuffed out in one stupid accident.

She clutched her hands around her stomach and tried to breathe through the threatening tears. She must have been shaking or sobbing aloud, since she woke Jack. His arms came around her and he pulled her up close against him. He kissed the back of her head and made soothing noises, but he didn’t tell her not to cry. It was good, having someone to hold you through the tears, Sam decided. It was very good.

~*~

“Doctor Carter?”

Sam looked up at the quiet interruption and smiled in welcome at Miko Kusanagi standing the doorway of her lab. “Hello, Miko! Come in, come in.”

“I hope that I am not disturbing you.”

“Not at all. How’s the arm?”

Flexing the arm in demonstration, the little scientist smiled. “It is nearly healed; I need only wear this brace now. My eye will be fine,” she pressed her fingers to the bandage over her injured eye.

‘If only all the injuries from the Antarctica disaster had been so easy to repair,’ Sam thought to herself as Miko came over and perched on the stool across from Sam.

“What brings you my way, Miko?” Sam had a feeling she knew, but doubted the shy scientist would brook the subject without an opening.

“I have heard a rumor. Rather than flounder around and believe half-truths, I have come to you,” Miko looked down at her lap as she spoke. “I heard Atlantis Project has been revived.”

Sam knew exactly where Miko had gotten her intel, and she vowed to smack Radek and give him a lecture on keeping things hush-hush, even from his new girlfriend. “I cannot confirm or deny at this time, but there is a possibility that the mission might be re-staffed and might be given the go-ahead by the IOA.” It was the most Sam could give her. Even she didn’t know what the final decision was going to be, and she was sleeping with one of the decision makers.

Miko looked up and smiled. “I understand, Doctor Carter. If mission does go forward, please, I would like to be considered for spot on science team.”

“You’re on my list, Doctor Kusanagi,” Sam assured her warmly, and got a smile in response.

“Thank you.” Miko slid off the stool. “I think I shall revisit the notes on the improvement for the dialing program.”

“That would be an excellent use of your time while we wait for word, Miko.”

“I shall perhaps see you at tea time in the Little Mess Hall?” Miko asked as she went to the door.

The break had become a daily habit since Miko had transferred to Area 51. She, Miko and Radek had tea every day at 4pm. Sam nodded and waved as her friend left the lab.

Her phone rang and she reached for it absentmindedly as she logged into the base net to check her messages. “Carter.”

“Don’t you check your email, woman?”

“Hello to you too, dear. I’m fine, having a lovely day,” she smiled as Jack grunted on the other end.

“I took the time to send you the damned thing; you could at least read it.”

She tabbed down to the message from Jack, with the subject line; _‘Most Important Thing You’ll Read All Day!’_

“Jack, did you send me another video of kittens singing Led Zeppelin songs?”

“Once, I forward you something silly once, and you never let me live it down. That was a cool video.”

Sam opened the email and smiled as she read the brief note. “Aw, Jack, you wrangled me another day at the mountain. How sweet.”

“I miss you.” The last week and a half apart had been hard, after being together almost constantly.

“Miss you too. But is this meeting what I think it is?”

He tried for his casual voice, but failed. “If you think it is regarding the disposition of the Atlantis Project, yes. The IOA weenie is coming in; all the major players need to make their final pitches. Get your pretty ass over here, Carter. I need you. Have you decided which side of the fence you’re on? I’d like to chalk you in on one team or the other before the meeting starts.”

Sighing, Sam knew it was time. She had waffled back and forth, driving Daniel and Jack crazy over the last few weeks as the fate of Daniel’s pet project was being debated on all levels. “If the mission is properly staffed, and all expedition members are aware that it is in all likelihood a one-way mission, then I would sign off on it.”

“Thanks, Sam.”

“You’re welcome. I want a steak dinner, just you and me and a nice bottle of red.”

“I know just the place; pack your little black dress.”

~*~

Walter Harriman’s voice came over the loudspeaker, “Unscheduled offworld activation!”

Leaving his spot at the conference table, Jack went to the stairs and jogged down to the control room as the last chevron locked into place. “Receiving Lieutenant Colonel Mitchell’s IDC.”

“Open the iris,” Jack ordered.

The comm cracked and a panicked female voice came over the line, barely audible over the pop and snap of weapons fire, shouting, “This is SG-1, we’re coming in hot, we have a medical emergency.”

“Understood, SG-1, you’re clear to proceed,” Walter said calmly and then pressed another button and spoke into the mike, “Medical team to the Gate Room.”

Mitchell rolled through the event horizon, scrambling to his feet to get clear as weapons fire followed him through. Jack rolled his eyes as he recognized the distinctive bolts fried by a Jaffa staff weapon. Some things never changed.

He was surprised to see Zelenka coming through next with Sheppard in a fireman’s carry across his shoulders. Cadman was bringing up the rear, firing madly back through the wormhole until it shut down at Mitchell’s hand signal to the Control Room to close it.

Once they were no longer under fire, Mitchell and Cadman immediately went to help Zelenka lower Sheppard to the ramp. Mitchell’s hands immediately moved to press against the Major’s blood soaked gut. Jack got to the Gate Room at the same time Janet Fraiser and the medical team arrived with a gurney.

Shoved aside, the members of SG-1 stood watching helplessly as Fraiser worked over their fallen teammate and then efficiently transferred him to a gurney to whisk him away to the infirmary. Having been in the same position numerous times during his tenure as SG-1’s leader, Jack felt a pang of sympathy for Sheppard’s three teammates, and moved towards them to offer what words of comfort he could.

“You did well. You got him back here.” Jack patted Radek’s blood soaked shoulder. They didn’t always get them back. Sometimes they died in field in the arms of their teammates, as their version of Janet Fraiser had. The Janet Fraiser that had just left the Gate Room was a refugee from a multi-verse incursion that had begged to be allowed to stay.

The scientist and Mitchell were both covered in Sheppard’s blood. “What happened?”

“It was a renegade system lord, working with the Lucian Alliance as we suspected. We got close enough to take him out, but there was a self-destruct on the base. Sheppard was trying to yank the core on the Ancient hologram platform we found and got caught in the blast,” Mitchell recited, his eyes on the trail of blood leading down the ramp to the Gate Room door.

Zelenka started to tremble slightly. “ _Hovno._ Should be me. He push me out of way,” he began to mutter under his breath in Czech.

Her eyes snapped to her teammate, and Cadman said sharply, “Don’t you fall apart on us, Radek. Sheppard was doing his job, protecting you.” The scientist nodded, and the slight quivering of his lower lip stopped.

With a sigh, Mitchell held out a blood drenched object to Radek. “He had this in his hand. See if it was worth it, would you?” The Czech nodded and sadly took the gory trophy.

Patting Radek on the shoulder, Cadman led him away towards the showers. Mitchell watched them go and then turned to Jack. “He’s not gonna make it. That was a bad gut wound,” there was a hitch to his voice as he made the pronouncement.

“Give Fraiser a chance. She’s got a hotshot surgeon up there in Carolyn Lam. They’ll pull our boy through.”

“I talked him into this, joining the Gate Team. All he wanted to do was fly the damned F-302s. I got him assigned to my team. I got him killed.”

Jack slapped his shoulder and echoed Cadman’s words, “Don’t fall apart on us yet, Mitchell. Go hit the showers and then stand your vigil. The mission report can wait; I have a fairly good idea of what happened, enough to keep Hammond off your back for a few hours, anyway.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir,” Mitchell saluted and slowly shuffled from the Gate Room.

Remembering that he was supposed to be involved in a meeting upstairs, Jack reluctantly headed back to the conference room, where the interested parties were still in the process of gathering for the dissection.

When the door opened and Sam breezed in, he couldn’t help but smile. She had worn the little black dress, and paired it with the glasses, lab coat and a bouncy ponytail. She was trying to kill him. Smiling, she came towards him, but the smile faded as she glanced down at his hand. “What happened?”

He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped away the traces of blood he’d picked up while patting Zelenka’s shoulder. “SG-1 came in hot.”

“Whose blood?”

“Sheppard’s, he’s in surgery by now.”

Sam closed her eyes briefly, her lips moving silently, and Jack knew she’d said a prayer for the injured pilot. She was like that; Sam still had faith after everything she had been through. It was one of the things he admired most about her. He wished he still had that level of belief.

He would use the excuse of going to wash his hands to get out of the meeting and check on Sheppard later, if he needed to. Jack wrinkled his nose as Woolsey and his cronies came into the room. Daniel arrived, escorting Rodney McKay, and dropped down into a seat at the table without looking Sam’s way. He was still smarting over her refusal to take his side previously. He didn’t know he had her vote now. Jack had not had the opportunity to tell him.

As General Hammond came in with Major Davis the conversations tapered off. When the General crooked a finger at him, calling him to the corner of the room, Jack went over. Quietly, Hammond asked, “There was a problem earlier?”

“SG-1 ran into that rogue system lord they were tracking. He had ties to the Lucian Alliance. They were attempting to retrieve a piece of Ancient tech and set off a booby trap. Major Sheppard is in surgery. He looked critical when they carried him in. The others are okay.”

The General nodded sadly. He took the loss of any SG team member to heart. He moved away to take his seat and call the meeting to order. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming today. As you know, we need to make a final decision on whether to continue on with the Atlantis Project or abandon it.”

The outspoken and irritating Chinese IOA representative stood up. “My government does not support this project; we see no benefit to it,” haughtily, she sat down, not saying anything further.

Richard Woolsey, looking uncomfortable with his peer’s outburst, gave an apologetic glance at Hammond and then shook his head in disapproval at the hostile Chinese woman. He went up a notch in O’Neill’s esteem as he said, “Yes, well, the Chinese government’s opinion is not the consensus of the IOA. As we came here to hear evidence; I suggest we let people speak before rendering opinion.”

“Doctor Jackson?” General Hammond invited Daniel to take the floor.

“According to the records we have been able to find, the lost city of Atlantis, if it remains intact, is quite likely to be the largest repository of Ancient knowledge and artifacts we have yet found. Until now we have been scrounging, picking up bits and pieces as we explore. This is a chance to learn so much more.”

“Do you have proof the city is intact, Doctor Jackson?” the Russian IOA rep asked.

Daniel nodded and hit a button on the remote near his hand, cuing up a display on the room’s large monitor screen.

“According to several texts we have translated, the Ancients left Atlantis due to a war they could not win. The city was not destroyed, but rather abandoned. The legends of Atlantis sinking were probably tales spread by the Ancients themselves to protect and preserve the city for the time when they would be able to return there.”

“How do we know they did not return there? Perhaps city is no longer lost at all,” the Russian man said.

“If that is the case, then perhaps we might meet the direct descendants of the Ancients. This is too much of an opportunity to let it pass by,” Daniel pleaded, looking in turn at each of the people he needed to convince. This was his last opportunity to hold onto this dream of his, he wasn’t above a bit of begging, or so it seemed to Jack.

Woolsey cleared his throat. “This is all well and good. We admit that this is an opportunity for technology acquisition far beyond our current level. The main concern we have is in the prospectus we were forwarded by the late Doctor Weir. In it, she clearly stated that traveling to the intended Gate address would drain the Earth ZPM.”

Clearing his throat, Hammond said, “Doctor McKay, if you would care to address this on behalf of the science team?”

“Yes, right.” McKay reached for the remote, which Daniel passed to him. A photograph of the ruined chair room in Antarctica came up on the screen when he pressed the button. Jack gave McKay a butt-load of credit for not flinching at the sight. He wasn’t certain that if the circumstances were reversed, he would be able to handle it.

McKay pressed the control on the arm of his wheelchair and moved close enough to the screen to use the laser pointer he gripped. “All of the salvageable components of the weapons chair platform have been recovered and reassembled at Area 51.”

The photo changed to show a clean lab at Area 51, with tech spread from one side of the photograph to the other. “The chair is non-functional. There is simply too much damage to the systems to repair it with our current level of understanding of Ancient technology. If the expedition goes forward, they may be able to recover information that will allow us to make it work again, as well recovering replacement parts. But until then the chair is useless to us.”

“So, the ZPM isn’t doing us any good here and now?” Jack prompted.

“None at all. The chair won’t work, end of story. We’ve got a stock pile of drones and no way to fire them. My team at Area 51 is working on developing a working system to direct the drones, but it will take time.” McKay glared around the room, challenging anyone to question him. No one did.

Woolsey tapped his pencil. “Doctor Weir spent months assembling the research team and conducting interviews in preparation for this mission. How much of that framework remains?”

“Many of the key scientists were lost at Antarctica; others will no longer be able to join the mission,” Sam looked sadly and pointedly at McKay as she said this. “The mission will need to be re-staffed. I’ve drawn up a list of the prospective scientists; most have already been vetted by the IOA on other projects. Unfortunately, there was a setback this morning on the military side; the strong ATA positive that had been recruited and was slated for inclusion on the Atlantis Project was critically injured on a mission.”

 _“Merde,”_ Daniel swore under his breath, running a hand over his face. Other than Sheppard, the strongest ATA they had on the prospective team was Sergeant Markham. The mission’s original Chief Medical Officer had been their key ATA gene holder. He’d been in the chair when the drone weapon misfired at the base. Unable to cope with his part in the Antarctica Disaster, Carson Beckett had resigned from the Stargate program and returned to Scotland.

“Is this still to be a joint military and scientific mission, as Doctor Weir had envisioned?” Woolsey asked, looking at the list Sam had provided.

Jack spoke up, “It is.”

Frowning, Woolsey looked up at Sam. “You’ll be stripping the program of some of the most brilliant physicists and engineers with this list, Doctor.”

With a nod, Sam explained, “Unfortunately, we’ll have to send some of our best and brightest if we hope to get the expedition back when the work is done. We need to send people capable of engineering a method to communicate with Earth, and to potentially work around the need for a ZPM to dial home. The IOA and the SGC can recruit new scientists to the program here; Atlantis will not have that luxury.”

McKay added sullenly, “Not all the best are going.”

“No. Not all,” Sam agreed sadly.

“I suggest a short break so that people can regroup and think about the reports they have,” General Hammond said. “Reconvene in half an hour.”

Glad for the break, Jack took the opportunity to go to the infirmary. Over the past few weeks Sheppard had become a new favorite of his. The pilot reminded him very much of himself in some ways. In a sullen line outside the infirmary doors, in the best SG team tradition, Mitchell, Cadman and Zelenka were holding up the wall.

Mitchell shook his head as Jack approached and pushed away from the wall. “Still in surgery, highly critical, Lam’s working on him. Fraiser sent word that he’s crashed twice. I’m holding off calling his father and brother until we know something definite.”

“Keep me in the loop.” His presence seemed to set the team on edge, so he left SG-1 to doing their waiting in private. Their formation might have been recent, but the new team had clicked and worked well together. Sheppard’s loss would be a hard blow to their new cohesion.

Jack stopped briefly at the men’s restroom and then returned to the conference room. He gave a small shake of his head at Hammond when the General raised a brow in question at him and said quietly, “Still in surgery.”

Wandering up to him, Daniel asked Jack, “Did you see the list Sam submitted?’

“I didn’t look through the packet yet. I was doing that when SG-1 came in.”

Daniel nodded. “I thought not; you’re taking it too well.” He turned and went back to his seat beside McKay, who was talking quietly with Sam. It was oddly discomforting to see Rodney McKay so subdued.

That was Daniel’s ‘You’d better pay attention, Jack’ voice. Jack went to his seat and grabbed for the briefing folder, flipping to Sam’s page. The name at the top of the list was Samantha Carter. He sat back in his chair and took a few deep breaths. Of course he had known it was a possibility she might be considered for the mission. With McKay out of it, she was the most qualified to lead the science division. He just hadn’t expected her to put herself forth so readily. He ran a hand over his face and then stared at her, willing her to look at him.

~*~

Sam knew he was watching her. She could feel his eyes boring into the back of her head. He had to have known when he pushed her to decide that morning what that decision would entail. She took a deep breath as Rodney finished explaining the diagram he had put in front of her, and then turned to look straight at Jack.

He looked stunned and hurt. That made her heart clench. He picked up the list and gave her a questioning glance. After so many years, this conversation didn’t need words. He was asking her, _‘Really?’_

She nodded. He sighed and put the paper down. He looked at her once more, with a look that asked, _‘You’re sure?’_

Gulping, she chewed her lower lip and nodded again.

He ran a hand over his face and threw his head back, staring at the ceiling. Jack’s Deep Thought Mode. She left him to it, looking away to listen to Daniel and Rodney’s discussion.

When they started again, Woolsey immediately said, “We have three concerns, the primary being Doctor Weir’s replacement as head of the mission. Colonel Sumner was approved as military head after much deliberation. A new military leader of suitable rank and experience will need to be recruited. We are now also concerned that there is no suitable ATA positive to accompany the mission. This was a major concern of Doctor Weir, she previously convinced us of the necessity for such people to be recruited.”

General Hammond said, “Of course we will do a thorough search for a replacement military commander, one with the qualifications, requi…”

“I’ll do it,” Jack interrupted.

“Excuse me, General?” Hammond said in surprise.

“I’ll do it. I’ll take Sumner’s place, hell, I’ll take Weir’s place. And I’ve got the ATA gene, all three of the IOA’s concerns addressed in one volunteer. Next problem?”

Always good at recovering quickly, Hammond stared at Jack for a moment. He looked over at Sam and then Daniel, realized the main reason Jack was doing this and nodded. He looked over at the IOA representatives. “There you have it, Mr. Woolsey; Brigadier General O’Neill will head the Atlantis Project, with your approval.”

Jack’s announcement seemed to put an end to the discussion.

“You’ll have our answer in a few days,” Woolsey said as he left.

Sam and Daniel rushed at Jack, both throwing their arms around him. He hugged them back before pushing them away. “You didn’t think I was sending half of my team to another galaxy without me?”

~*~

Waiting for the IOA approval to come through was nerve wracking. While Sam and Daniel were on edge worrying about the Atlantis Project, Jack and SG-1 worried that Sheppard wasn’t going to recover. He’d survived the surgery, but a secondary infection had knocked him down again, and he was back on a ventilator, in hyper-critical condition once more.

Sam was staying with Jack, needing to be near him while they waited. She was coordinating her projects at Area 51 by phone, computer and video conference. They drove back to his apartment, Jack’s eyes on the road, while Sam looked out the window.

“If this is a go, we probably won’t be coming back, you know,” Sam said as he pulled into the parking space in front of his apartment complex.

“I know.” He walked around the car to join her, dropping a kiss on her forehead and slipping his hands around her waist. “Listen, Sam, maybe before we leave, we should…”

She interrupted him. “Get married.”

“Damn, it woman! Would you stop doing that?” He caught her chin in his hand and kissed her lips. “Is that a yes? Even if we don’t go to Atlantis?”

She nodded. Then she reached into her purse and handed him a small velvet box. “My parent’s rings.”

“Always jumping in front of me, Carter. I guess you researched the where and how to do it in Colorado Springs too?”

She nodded and went up on tiptoe to kiss his mouth. “I love you, Jack O’Neill.”

 

The next afternoon, she repeated it, standing in front of a clerk at the town hall, with Daniel, Radek and a sobbing Miko standing as witnesses. Afterwards, the five of them went out for a sedate celebratory lunch before returning to their duties at the SGC. If things worked out, they would have plenty of time for a honeymoon in the Pegasus Galaxy. If things did not work out, Jack promised they would go to Hawaii.

~*~

The last chevron locked in place and Harriman’s announcement was met with a cheer by the expedition assembled in the Gate Room. The MALP rolled through and they waited anxiously for the data to transfer back through the wormhole. When they saw a dark Gate Room on the video feed, and the stats came back with Earth normal atmosphere and gravity, another cheer went up.

Sam watched everything happening with a sense of excitement and a lot of trepidation. The weeks of preparation had led to this moment, and now that it was here, she was a little scared.

“General O’Neill, you have a go,” Hammond announced into the microphone.

The operations officer, Major Lorne, formerly of SG-11, took up a position at the head of the ramp and started barking orders and directing the traffic up the ramp.

“Bye, George, we’ll write. Hopefully my girl figures out how to work the Atlantis email.” Jack gave a jaunty wave at the control room and hoisted his P-90. Before ducking through the puddle, he looked back over his shoulder and called, “Bye, Teal’c.”

Teal’c had come to wish his former teammates a good journey, when he had heard they were going on a possible one way trip. The original SG-1 team had gone to dinner and reminisced over drinks and dessert. Clad in his long robes and clutching his staff weapon in one hand, he stood in the Gate Room, stoically watching his friends leave. Sam’s heart clenched as she looked at him; he seemed so alone and apart.

He raised a hand in parting to O’Neill as Jack disappeared through the Gate. They had said their proper farewells that morning. Jack had insisted that he didn’t want to deal with any waterworks or mushy scenes from Teal’c in front of his command. Even under torture, Teal’c would never reveal that it was O’Neill that had been wet eyed and speechless before they walked to the Gate Room together.

“Farewell, Daniel Jackson,” Teal’c said as Daniel paused in his progress towards the ramp to clasp his arm.

“Bye, Teal’c.”

“Daniel Jackson, I am curious.”

Daniel paused and turned to look at him. Nearby, Sam took a few steps closer, trying to hear what Teal’c was saying.

“About what?”

“Why did you not attempt to persuade me to accompany you on your mission?”

“You have your son and the Jaffa council. It didn’t seem fair to put you on the spot like that.”

Teal’c inclined his head. “Indeed.”

Daniel waved and jogged up the ramp between trolleys of gear, scientists and marines.

Trying to get to Teal’c, Sam bumped into someone. She turned to apologize. “Sorry. Oh, Doctor Parrish! Why are you carrying… tomato plants?”

“These are a special strain from a personal project. I do not intend to go without marinara sauce for long, Doctor Carter. Tomato sauce can cover a host of sins and bad flavors.”

She smiled after him as he tromped up the ramp with the others. She made it over to Teal’c and went up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “I’ll miss you most of all,” she whispered.

“Do you feel as Daniel Jackson does, that Rya’c and the council are more important to me than your well being?”

“It wouldn’t have been fair to make you choose, Teal’c. I love you too much to put you in that position.” She squeezed his arm and kissed him again. She straightened the straps of her backpack and turned away to go.

Teal’c looked up towards the Control Room and called, “General Hammond, I have made my decision. Farewell.”

Confused, Sam watched Teal’c bend to pick up s SGC-issued pack that had been sitting near his feet. He slung the straps over one shoulder, hoisted his staff weapon over the other and stepped up beside her. He reached down and clasped her hand, giving it a squeeze. “Let us go, Samantha Carter.”

Sam was certain she had tears streaming down her face as she walked through the wormhole, hand in hand with Teal’c.

~*~

George Hammond watched as the last of the scientists walked through the event horizon at the thirty minute mark, precisely according to Major Lorne’s timetable. “Well done Major,” Hammond said into the microphone as the gear trolleys and marines moved in with the secondary mission equipment lists.

Acknowledging the praise with a wave, Lorne smiled and barked at some marines to move faster. At the thirty two minute mark, he waved again and followed the last of the medical supplies through to Atlantis. They were not positive that the connection would stay open the usual thirty eight minutes, though they hoped it would. The equipment scheduled to ship after thirty two minutes was deemed secondary, all essential equipment and supplies were already gone. Anything sent through between thirty two minutes and when the wormhole collapsed would be gravy.

Hammond looked through the window down to the nearly abandoned Gate Room and eyed the dolly carrying the two modified nuclear missiles being moved into place. “General O’Neill is going to be very surprised,” Lieutenant Colonel Mitchell said from behind Hammond.

“I like keeping Jack on his toes. Surprises are the best way to do that,” Hammond replied. “SG-1, you have a go. Good luck, Colonel, look after Jack for me.” He clasped Mitchell’s hand and firmly shook it.

“We’ll do that, sir.” Mitchell saluted smartly and jogged down to join his team in the Gate Room.

Radek smiled up at him as he came through the door. “So, we are going, yes?” Mitchell nodded.

“Can I ride?” Cadman begged, grabbing the rails beside the missile.

“I wanna ride,” Sheppard said as he nudged her aside and put his foot up on the frame of the dolly. “You push. I’m still weak from surgery.”

Cadman snorted. “Bullshit! I know what you were doing last night and if you can do that, you can certainly help us push!”

“Sheppard, is that a skateboard strapped to your pack?” Mitchell demanded as he joined his team on the ramp.

Taking a box that a marine ran up and handed him, Radek leaned over and glanced up and down Sheppard’s back. “Yes Colonel, is skateboard, our daredevil yet lives.”

Hammond rolled his eyes as SG-1 continued to argue as they pushed the missiles through to Atlantis and disappeared through the event horizon. Hammond hoped Mitchell had remembered to take the note.

~*~

“Uhm, General?” Chuck the Canadian tech tapped Jack on the arm to get his attention.

“Busy. The city is sinking, according to Carter,” Jack waved him off without looking at him. Carter was bent over the Ancient console in what appeared to be the Ancient version of the Gate Control Room, trying to shut off systems and conserve what little power remained in the city.

Undaunted, Chuck asked, “Were there missiles on the manifest, sir?”

“No.”

“We have missiles,” Chuck intoned and pointed towards the Gate when Jack finally looked over at him.

Jack rolled his eyes at the sight of a weapons dolly piercing the wormhole. “Clear the deck, make room!” Jack bellowed as he ran to the railing, echoing the order Lorne had just given down on the floor.

“I’ll be damned. We also have a few stowaways.” Jack laughed and waved to Mitchell and the rest of SG-1 as they came through the Gate just before it closed, cutting them all off from Earth for the foreseeable future. Jack went to the door of the Control Room and called, “Sam, SG-1 is here, all of them.”

She glanced up and gave him a distracted nod before looking back at her work. Then she looked up again. “SG-1? Thank heavens! I need Zelenka. Send him here, now.”

The Czech was rushed up the stairs to Sam’s side. She quickly brought him up to speed, pointing to computer screens and Ancient displays as she spoke. “There’s a problem. The city was apparently drained of power, we’re underwater, and the shields holding back the water have started to fail because automatic systems started coming on when we arrived.”

“We bring ZPM, we yanked it from SGC, is not much left, but is something,” he held up the box containing the severely drained ZPM.

Sam smiled in relief. “That will help, if we figure out where to put it.”

“Stop touching things!” Jack yelled and slapped Sheppard’s hands as he came into the Control Room and started running his hands all over the consoles.

“I can’t help it,” Sheppard whined. “Don’t you feel it? It _wants_ to be touched.”

Sam smirked as Jack explained, “We have to stop powering things up and draining power. So just… control yourself, Sheppard. Don’t molest the city.”

“Daniel, see if you can find something that might tell us where to plug the ZPM in. There has to be a main power station,” Sam called to Daniel, who was bent over another Ancient terminal.

“You want a map? There’s a map,” Sheppard pointed to a wall, where a display that had not been there previously was suddenly glowing.

All eyes in the room turned to Sheppard, who shrugged and blushed under the scrutiny.

“What did you do?” O’Neill demanded. “I told you not to touch anything!”

“I didn’t touch anything! I just thought that it would be great to have a map showing the ZPM chamber, and the wall made a map.”

Jack rolled his eyes. Great. Just great. He had a loose cannon that could turn shit on with his mind. “Fine. SG-1, take the mostly dead ZPM down to the power station and swap it out. Sheppard, no more thinking. Do not turn anything else on! Do you understand me, Major?”

“Yes, sir.”

Sometimes, it was like dealing with children, Jack thought as they piled out of the room. How had Hammond put up with them all these years? His opinion was only reinforced as he heard Cadman singing in the stairwell, “You got in trouble. John got in trouble.”

~*~

Sam breathed a sigh of relief. SG-1’s unplanned arrival had probably saved their asses. Their ZPM had just enough power to maintain the shields for a short time while they worked out a better solution.

It was also good to have Zelenka working with her. Leaving him behind with SG-1 had been a great sacrifice on her part. When he returned to the Control Room, they set about connecting their computers and networking themselves into the Ancient systems.

“Doctor Carter?”

“Sam, Radek.”

“Sam, Radek,” he repeated dutifully. It was a habit since her detachment. “What if we raise city to surface?”

She blinked at him. “How do we do that?”

“Major Sheppard could ask nicely. City likes him.”

Standing near the wall listening, Jack snorted. Suddenly, the floor beneath them began to shake violently. The lights began to flash and warning klaxons, both SGC and Ancient home-grown varieties, began to sound. The entire city seemed to shift, and people screamed as they were thrown to the floor.

“Hang on!” Jack ordered into his headset. They had hooked up a comms system to which almost everyone on the expedition was connected. “Brace yourselves on something.”

“What did Sheppard touch now?” Radek demanded as he tried to keep his seat in front of the console.

“Sheppard didn’t, I did. I told the city to rise,” Jack snapped. When Sam looked over at him with a raised eyebrow, he said sheepishly, “I can sorta hear it too. I just have better impulse control.”

~*~

When things settled down, and Atlantis was safely bobbing on the surface of the ocean, Jack came to the Control Room and called, “Carter, come here.”

“I’ve just gotta…”

“Samantha, come and look.” Jack held a hand out to her, and she reluctantly left the chair she had commandeered hours before and went to him. He squeezed her hand and drew her along a corridor and through a room to a set of balcony doors. Outside, the view was breathtaking; she could see the city spread out around them and ocean as far as the horizon.

“Oh,” she whispered, leaning over the railing and looking down. He stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her and admiring the view. She leaned back against him and gave a sigh.

After about fifteen minutes, Jack squeezed her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. “C’mon it’s time for We’re Not Dead Sex.” Jack grabbed her hand and pulled her after him towards the doors.

She balked, stopping short. “What?”

“The We’re Not Dead Sex that we haven’t been having for eight years? I want it now ‘cause, well - we’re not dead!”

“There’s no such thing.”

He rolled his eyes at her. “Is too. We just haven’t been having it. C’mon.”

Digging in her heels, she refused to be led. “Jack, I have work to do, systems to put in place.”

“A very horny husband to placate. C’mon Sam, a quickie, you’ll think better, sex makes you think better.”

Laughing, she let him lead her inside. “Someday, I might find out where you get all these sexual facts.”

“Years of experience, Grasshopper.”

“Where are we going?”

“I did recon. I found a spot.” He led her down a corridor to a door which opened as they approached. “Jedi mind tricks are so cool,” Jack drawled.

It was a storage closet. There were lighted panels in the ceiling and lighted decorations on the wall, so they could see. He dragged her inside and into his arms, kissing her until she was mindless with passion. He wasn’t often aggressive like this. He tended to treat her like a china doll most of the time. This was a nice change.

She let him have his way, this time.

~*~ 

Later, as they cuddled on the floor of the closet, he kissed her face and pet her as she snuggled against him and enjoyed the afterglow.

“Oh, I like We’re Not Dead Sex,” Sam mumbled sleepily.

“I think you liked being a naughty girl, knowing we might get caught.”

Sam giggled, unable to deny the facts.

“Okay, I promised a quickie. You have work to do naughty girl, so up you go.” Jack slapped her ass and prodded her until she stood up. He handed up her clothes, and they dressed awkwardly in the tight space. Fascinated by the decorations on the wall, Sam had stopped dressing with her pants only partially pulled up.

“This is weird, Jack. I wonder what these do?”

He shrugged and reached for her clothing, finishing the job she wasn’t doing while she stared at the wall decoration. He had some difficulty doing her pants up from behind her; he grumbled about how it was much easier to get a person out of clothes than it was to get them into them.

He waved his hand at the door release and stepped out, and looked around in confusion at the dark corridor and water stained walls. “Uhm, Sam, I don’t think we’re where we’re supposed to be.”

She leaned out and looked around, then disappeared back into the closet. A moment later, realizing he wasn’t beside her, she reached out and grabbed his shirt and pulled him back inside. She turned towards the decoration, which she suspected was not purely ornamental, and pressed a finger against a symbol on the lighted panel.

As she tossed her chin at the door release, he waved a hand over it. It opened to reveal a different corridor in the more familiar central tower. “I think we found a transporter.”

He grunted at the discovery. His expression brightened as he asked, “Can we call it the Wonkovator?”

Sam shook her head at him and stepped out. They walked towards the Control Room, and Sam’s mind was already going over the list of things she had to do.

As they turned the corner, Jack grabbed her arm and stopped her. He straightened her shirt and brushed her hair down, then kissed the top of her head and smiled at her.

“What are you smiling at, Jack?” In response, he started to hum Aerosmith’s _“Love in an Elevator.”_

~*~

Exploring the city was going to take a lot of time. They also needed to start searching for a ZPM and send teams out to meet the neighbors and set up trading partnerships for fresh supplies.

Jack spent the first three days in Atlantis making maps and setting up search grids of the city with his XO, Major Lorne. They had all agreed that Lieutenant Colonel Mitchell would be best left with SG-1, heading Off-world operations. Lorne might not have the rank, but he was the better administrator.

Getting the marines out of the temporary barracks set up in the Gate Room and the corridors around it was high on the list. They had people sleeping in the mess hall and the storage areas around the Gate Room while personnel quarters got sorted. SG-1 was bunking down in a puppy pile in the corner of the Gate Room, which made Jack shake his head every time he stood at the rail and looked down. He and Sam had been sleeping on an air mattress in the glass enclosed room near the Control Room that he had claimed to use as his office. There were a dozen people using a large conference room on the Control Room level as sleeping space. Teal’c and Daniel were sharing another air mattress in the corner of Jack’s office. Many people were sleeping in their work areas for safety. They had to find secure quarters and work areas for everyone on the expedition, and that had become a priority.

O’Neill turned the responsibility of exploration and native meet and greets over to Mitchell, after hinting strenuously that Teal’c should be allowed to retake his former position with SG-1. His experience would be invaluable to the mostly unseasoned SG-1, especially when it came to trade negotiations.

The Ancient database had become Daniel’s pet project. He disappeared soon after rising in the morning to a work station he had set up somewhere to access the database. He didn’t come back to sleep until late in the evening. Jack was going to give him two more days with his new obsession before stepping in to curtail his friend’s hours, for his own good.

Mitchell, Sheppard and Lorne had whooped like children when the landing bay full of small ships had been found above the Gate Room. Pulling them away from the puddlejumpers - as Sheppard started calling them when it was discovered they could be used to go through the Gate - was nearly impossible. If Jack hadn’t declared the Puddlejumper Bay off limits as staff housing, he had no doubt his flyboys would have taken up permanent residence there.

Despite the housing hardships, morale was high throughout the expedition. People were cooperating in getting things set up, and eager to get on to the work of exploring the city and the Pegasus galaxy. For a group of people on a one way mission, they were an awfully happy lot, Jack thought as he wandered around checking on things.

~*~

“I got a message you wanted to see me, Sam?” Mitchell poked his head through the door of the lab and looked around cautiously before stepping inside. It was a good habit that most of them had gotten into since arriving. There had been some rather nasty surprises jumping out at them. The latest had been a virus that killed three people before they found the source and shut it down. Frustration over the event had made Janet Fraiser angrier than Sam could ever remember the sedate little doctor getting. The quarantine protocols that Fraiser put into place after that were stricter than the SGC on lockdown. But it was always best not to anger the lady with the big needles, and so they were adhering to the restrictive procedures during their continued exploration of the city.

“It’s safe in here, Cam,” she waved to him and he smiled. “And I did want to talk to you.”

He hopped up on the table beside her laptop, swinging his feet. “So, ‘sup?”

“I need Radek, full time. I know he’s part of your team, but until we get things running smoothly, I need him as an engineer more than you need him on exploration.”

As Sam had expected, he frowned, not liking the request. He whined and drawled at the same time, a habit he was picking up from Sheppard. “I just got the little guy broken in.”

“Only temporarily, Cam. Maybe a few months. If you have a mission requiring a scientist, you can rotate one of the staff in, or steal Radek now and then. Anyone can be taught to look at energy readings and decide if they are within acceptable parameters, or activate equipment. I’m sure Cadman can do it, someone can teach her. ”

His eyes went wide and he slapped his hands to his cheeks in mock horror. “Teach Cadman something new and potentially dangerous? Good God, woman, are you insane? She already has enough knowledge to blow us all to kingdom come!”

She waited until he grew serious again and then said, “Please, Cam?”

“Okay, temporarily. But you gotta tell him, and you gotta tell him it was your idea; I don’t want him feeling like we kicked him off the team because we didn’t want him or something.”

“Agreed. So, I heard you’ve got your first scheduled off world mission.”

He nodded. “Yeah, Daniel got us a list out of the database. I’m skeptical. That phone book is ten thousand years out of date, but at least we have some addresses that we know were habitable planets back in the day. Hey, since this is our first mission and all, could we take Radek? One more playdate with the team before you take him away from us?”

Chuckling, Sam said, “Sure.”

“So, how’s married life?”

“So far, so good, I have no complaints. How’s things with you?”

He gave her a very big smile. “So far, so good, but my bedmate is a blanket hog.”

Jack’s voice came over the citywide intercom, “Senior Staff please report to my office.”

Bounding off the table, Cam headed for the door as Sam followed at a more sedate pace.

They joined the others in the room. Stackhouse, the recently named head of security, was leaning against a wall, looking uncomfortable on his first outing as a member of the Senior Staff. Doctor Fraiser had commandeered a spot of the sofa and sipped at her coffee, patting the spot beside her in invitation for Sam to join her. Lorne and Jack were bent over the desk, discussing the map that was spread out in front of them. Teal’c, being Teal’c, came and went as he pleased, and apparently, it pleased him to be part of this meeting. Sheppard was sitting in Jack’s desk chair. More specifically Sheppard was slumped across the chair in an artful sprawl, head thrown back as he stared at the ceiling.

They were apparently, as usual, waiting on Daniel in order to start the meeting. He arrived with a stream of apologies and then demanded, “What’s up?”

“Sheppard found a new toy.”

“I didn’t touch it. I found it and I reported back.” Sheppard said smugly, crossing his arms and looking at Cam as if challenging his CO to reprimand him.

Jack thumped the back of Sheppard’s chair and prodded, “Tell the class what you found, Johnny.”

“The city has a chair room; it was kinda like the ruined chair I saw in Antarctica. I swear, I didn’t touch it.”

“We believe you; after all, nothing has blown up,” Sam said and then looked to Jack. “This could be very good.”

Jack tapped his chin thoughtfully, “So, in addition to the shield, the city might have the same defensive capabilities the Antarctica weapons platform had?”

Smiling happily at this, Sam nodded.

“That is probably a good thing.” Daniel said, drawing everyone’s attention. “I came across a lot of info on the creatures the Ancients were at war with. They called them Wraith. They exist by sucking the life force out of Ancients, or humans, as the case may be. The Ancients couldn’t defeat these creatures; they ultimately fled and sank the city to get away from them.”

Mitchell looked at Daniel and said, “Maybe they’re all dead? Ten thousand years is a long time.”

“Be on your guard when you go out there, Mitchell, Teal’c, Sheppard. Keep your ears open and your mouths shut as much as possible. Recon first, contact second,” Jack advised.

Sheppard caught Mitchell’s eye and said, “Duct tape. Cadman’s mouth.” He mimed gagging his teammate, which earned him a disapproving glare from Mitchell.

“Anyone else have anything to address?” Jack looked around the room, Fraiser waved off the opportunity to speak, as did Daniel. He’d done his bad news for the day, apparently. Mitchell shook his head, as did Stackhouse.

Sam cleared her throat and told them, “I’m stealing Zelenka from SG-1 and putting him in charge of engineering. The water desalinization and the sewage systems need an overhaul; they were severely damaged over the years as the city’s shielding failed. I’ll take Sheppard and check out the chair when we finish here. Janet, if you’d be willing to come along?”

“Of course, I’ll just swing past the infirmary and grab a field kit.”

Sitting up a little straighter in his seat, Sheppard looked from Sam to Janet with concern. “Wait, is this chair dangerous?”

“A chair like that one led to the destruction of the Antarctica base, Sheppard. In the wrong hands, it is deadly. So do what Sam tells you, and think happy thoughts,” Jack told him. Looking only slightly mollified, Sheppard nodded.

“We’ve got about seventy five percent of the staff situated in work areas, and about the same in permanent residence quarters,” Lorne said when Jack pointed at him for his report. “I’m keeping the marines grouped together in a couple of rooms two levels down from the Gate Room, temporary barracks until Stackhouse and I have worked out what our security needs will be. I don’t advise spreading out over the city at this time. There are too many dangerous variables to take into account. I think it is better to remain in the vicinity of the main tower and the Gate Room.”

Jack said, “I agree with the Major’s assessment. If there’s nothing else, get back to work, people.”

As people drifted out, Sam pointed at Sheppard and crooked a finger at him. He shuffled over to join her. She smiled and patted his arm. “Good work finding the chair, and good thinking, not giving in to the temptation to drop your ass into it.”

“It was hard. Doctor Carter, it’s like the thing almost talks to me.”

Sam shook her head and looked at Janet. “If I hadn’t heard similar statements from Jack over the years about Ancient tech, I’d worry about that statement a lot more than I do. Let’s go see what we’ve got, shall we?”

She collected a laptop and a few diagnostic tools and followed Sheppard. As they were walking to the infirmary, they heard quick footsteps behind them. “So, you find new interesting things and do not tell me? You are bad friend, John!” Radek chided as he fell into step with them.

“You were busy with Miko. I didn’t know it was such a big thing until I told Lorne about it and he dragged me to tell O’Neill and then I had to stay for the meeting.”

Glad to have Radek along, Sam decided to take the chance of telling him about his position change before Sheppard blabbed. “Radek, after this afternoon’s mission, I’m pulling you off SG-1 temporarily. I need you running Engineering full time.”

“No more running for my life?”

“For a while, anyway.”

“Is good. Cadman is going to get me killed, I have premonition of this. Is better I stay in city.”

That had gone far better than Sam had expected.

“Major Sheppard, hop up on the scanner there. I’d like to get a baseline reading before we do anything else,” Fraiser told him as they entered the infirmary. She pointed to one of the Ancient devices someone else had managed to initiate. Sheppard had been avoiding the infirmary as much as possible. He’d had enough of doctors and sickbeds to last him quite a while.

He did as he was told, and soon the four of them were on their way to the Eastern Tower. Curiosity made Sam ask, “How did you manage to find this room, Sheppard?”

“She led me. I got tired of trying to block out the static and I just let my mind go blank and followed the noise until I found myself in the room.”

Staring at his teammate, Radek intoned, “I am glad I do not have ATA gene. Would make me, as you say, freak out.”

“Not too thrilled with it myself, buddy. Except for the puddlejumpers; being able to fly those is cool.”

Sam smiled at the tone of Sheppard’s voice. She knew all of their pilots were chomping at the bit to be allowed to do more than just hover and float the little ships around the docking bay.

They arrived at the chair room and set up their diagnostic tools before Sam gestured to the chair. “Okay, Major, have at it. As Jack said, think happy thoughts. Try to talk us through anything you see or feel.”

He hesitated, running a hand over the frame of the chair as he circled around it. It flickered blue under his touch, as the damaged chair in Antarctica had done months earlier. With a sigh of resignation, he sat. The chair immediately tilted back.

“What should I do?”

“Start simple. Ask it to show you a map and your location on it.” A 3-D lighted representation of the city flared to life over the chair, with the tower and room they were in marked with a blinking yellow light.

“Cool,” Sheppard commented.

“Ask to trace sewage blockage in main tower,” Radek suggested. “We might as well test with useful tests.”

“I’m getting all sorts of jibber jabber in another language in my head.”

Sam moved to stand beside the chair and advised, “Tell it to run everything through a translation program. That should slow it down and make it easier for you.”

“Right, okay, that seemed to cut the babble a little. I’m getting a lot of pictures.” The area over Sheppard flashed with display screens. Sam realized that this was going to take some time and practice on Sheppard’s part to learn to control and utilize efficiently. Sam said so to the group.

Fraiser came over to Sheppard’s side and began checking his vitals. Apparently content that he was in no danger, she stepped away again.

“Ask for security check,” Radek said.

Lights began to flash red, more screens came up and Sheppard winced as if he was in pain. “Ow, overload. It’s like she’s running through every building in the city at once and sending me the data. Are you getting this? I’m trying to keep her to the buildings around the main tower. Hopefully some of this is useful for Lorne and his teams.”

“We’re recording it, Sheppard,” Sam assured him.

They fell into a pattern over the next two hours, of trying to isolate information and get a handle on using the chair to monitor the city.

Sheppard was growing tired; Sam could see it on his face and hear it in his voice. With more enthusiasm than he had shown in the past hour, he suddenly blurted out, “Huh, this is weird. I keep getting this request, like a pop up asking for pilot data. Should I respond?”

“It’s up to you, Major. You’ve got a better idea by now of how these commands feel. Go with your gut.” Sam waved Janet over to do another vitals check, concerned at how draining this seemed to be on the man.

He fell silent for a long while. Just as Sam was about to poke him, he blurted, “Holy sh...!”

“What? John, what is it?” Sam grabbed his arm and squeezed when he didn’t reply right away. “Sheppard, shut it down, pull out, you’re done for today, that’s enough.”

He sat up and looked at them all in giddy amazement. “We’ve got a star drive, pilot interface, interstellar shielding settings - Doctor Carter, this isn’t just a city, Atlantis is a ship, she’s a starship.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Sam whispered, sharing Sheppard’s excitement.

~*~

After sending SG-1 on eight trips through the Gate with no results or incidents, Jack O’Neill decided to take the team out himself. Lorne and his never-ending paperwork were making Jack’s nose itch. He needed to do something besides read reports, authorize personnel housing requests and mitigate science team conflicts. Suiting up in a TAC vest and signing a P-90 out of the armory, Jack joined SG-1 in the Gate Room.

“Sir?” Mitchell asked as Jack sauntered over to them.

“I want to evaluate how you guys perform in the field.”

Sheppard and Mitchell looked nervous and made a show of double checking their equipment, and then doing a buddy check on each other. Stepping close to O’Neill, Teal’c smiled at his friend and checked his TAC vest. “You are bored again, are you not O’Neill?”

“Yup. It was either this or I was going to duct tape Lorne to a chair and throw things at him.”

“Indeed. The major does have a fondness for paperwork.”

Running footsteps caught Jack’s attention and he turned to see Cadman charging down the corridor. “Get a move on, marine, we haven’t got all day!” Jack called and signaled Chuck to start the dialing sequence.

When they stepped onto the planet, the first thing they saw was someone’s laundry strung on a line fluttering in the breeze. Cadman’s jaw dropped and she turned to stare at Jack. Mitchell shook his head and chuckled under his breath.

“You have village summoning powers!” Sheppard declared, looking at Jack with a tiny bit of awe.

“Just lucky, I guess. C’mon kids, let’s go meet the natives. Best smiles everybody, look friendly.” Jack strolled off in the direction of the village.

 

A boy dropped his ball and stared as they approached. He was clad in a button down shirt and trousers and had a straw hat perched atop his head. “Greetings, strangers!” He waved and ran up to Jack and Teal’c.

“Hello.”

“Have you come to trade?” The boy looked them all over, and pointed to the packs that Mitchell and Sheppard wore.

Jack looked at his team and replied, “Yes, yes we have. Could you take us to someone that handles that?”

The boy nodded, knocking his hat askew, and led them further down a dirt road. They passed some houses, and spotted people working. “We’ve landed in a living renaissance fair,” Cadman remarked to Sheppard.

“Duct tape,” Sheppard replied, code for ‘shut up Cadman.’ She huffed at him and flounced over to walk with Teal’c.

They were taken to a building that probably served as a village meeting house. Raldo, their young guide, had gone off to fetch the person of importance they needed to speak to. The team spread themselves out around the room, surveying the place. It didn’t take long; there wasn’t much to see. The room was sparsely furnished and simply decorated.

“Greetings, Raldo tells me you’ve come to trade?” A ruddy-faced man with blonde curls asked as he came through the door.

Mitchell and Teal’c deferred to Jack, letting him take the lead on this one. “Yes, we have. I’m Jack O’Neill.”

“I’m Cowen. I speak for the Genii.”

“I speak for… Earth,” Jack finished lamely.

Cowen looked around at the rest of the team. “You’re soldiers?’

“We’re an advanced party; we just go ahead to make sure the way is clear for our civilians to step through. Gate travel to unknown worlds can be hazardous, I’m sure you understand.”

The Genii nodded. “Yes, it can be. We know that all too well. We’re a simple people; and very self sufficient. We have almost everything we need. We farm tava beans.”

“We have medicine to trade, called penicillin. It helps get rid of infections.” It was a standard SGC trade good, the Atlantis expedition had been supplied with a ton of it. Literally, they had a metric ton of the stuff, Lorne had seen to it.

“We might be willing to trade for that.”

Cowen was a shrewd negotiator, and in the end he refused to go any higher on the bushels of tava beans the Genii offered, claiming they would have to clear stumps from a field and it would take more manpower than the trade was worth to do it.

“We might be able to help with that,” Cadman blurted. When Jack turned and scowled at her, she shrugged and said, “C-4. I have some. It would make quick work of removing the stumps.”

The Genii perked up at that, and reluctantly, Jack was coerced into letting Cadman demonstrate root removal via C-4. It was a great hit with the farmers. Sensing that a punishment detail for the big mouthed marine that including staying behind and blowing up roots all day would be more of a reward than a penance, Jack tasked Sheppard and Mitchell with helping the Genii and sent Cadman back to Atlantis to file the paperwork. An afternoon cooped up in an office with Lorne was the perfect punishment for the little menace, Jack decided.

~*~

“Nice people?” Sam asked as she puttered around folding laundry while Jack sat at the desk in their quarters finishing the reports on the mission. With a snort, he rejected Cadman’s report with yet another note to rewrite it in black ink and a demand that she turn over every pink, purple and turquoise pen in her possession to him immediately.

“Nice enough. Weird. Something off about them I couldn’t get a handle on. But we need the supplemental protein source their tava beans will provide, so we’ll have to deal with a little oddness.”

She nodded and hummed to herself as she enjoyed the domesticity of the moment. She was watching him, waiting for him to finish the bulk of his work so she could pounce on him. Knowing his body language, she was waiting for the tell-tale slump that would signal his relief at being done with the bothersome task.

“Now that you had a chance to observe them in the field, what’s your assessment of SG-1?”

“They’re nuts. Good nuts, functional dysfunction. Teal’c likes them.”

She laughed. “Always a good sign.”

“Yeah, they work well off each other.” Jack leaned back and stretched his arms over his head. And then Sam saw what she’d been waiting for. Sidling over to his chair, she wrapped her arms around him and nuzzled her nose behind his ear.

“Mmmm,” Jack gave a happy moan and tangled a hand in her hair, holding her in place.

“Come to bed, Jack.”

“That is an invitation I cannot refuse. Coming, dear.”

Having waited quite a while for him, Sam eagerly bounced to the bedroom, casting off clothing as she went. Jack’s laughter at her eagerness made her smile and she spun around to open her arms in invitation.

He went to her, pulling her to him, running his hand over her bare back as she pressed against him. He kissed her, claiming her mouth in a rough kiss as his hands kneaded her back. Her fingers tugged at the hem of his t-shirt, then slid to his belt as she silent made her demand that he get with the program and lose the clothing.

He was quite happy to abide by her wishes.

~*~

Jack looked up from his laptop as Radek Zelenka appeared in his doorway and rapped his knuckles on the frame. “C’mon in, Doctor Z, that seems like a worried look, is that a worried look? I really hope I’m wrong.”

“ _Ano,_ you are not wrong, General O’Neill. An alert came up in Ancient system this morning; Chuck found it and brought it to my attention, since Doctor Carter is working with shield and chair projects. I have been analyzing, and I believe we may have problem with weather.”

“Weather, as in rain and snow? Surely the shield can handle a little water?”

Radek moved to the desk and held out a datapad to Jack. “Not if my calculations are correct. This is a massive storm; of the sort that only happen once in centuries. Atlantis was protected under the sea while she was vacant, but now, we are exposed. This is massive storm. The shields will take almost all of our remaining ZPM power to maintain for merely a few hours of bombardment by this magnitude.”

“And then?”

“And then the city will flood and sink.”

“Damn it.” He ran a hand over his head and twisted his lips at the news. Then he tapped his radio. “Sam?”

“I’m a little busy right now, Jack.”

“The city is gonna sink.”

There was silence for a moment as his words sunk in. “What?”

“Storm. Flood. Sinking.”

“Don’t be a wise-ass now, Jack.”

“I live to be a wise-ass; do I have your attention?” At her murmur of assent, he explained quickly what Radek had told him.

She sighed heavily. “All right. Tell Radek I’ll meet him in the physics lab. You should probably start evacuation procedures. Just in case.”

“Evac to where? We’ve yet to find a suitable Alpha Site; I don’t think our new Amish friends would appreciate us crashing their farm stand. We only just gave them our phone number the other day.”

Sam’s breath was strained as she was apparently running to the lab where she would meet Radek. “There’s a bunch of caves on the mainland, the survey team checked them out, they seemed sound, certainly safer than staying on a sinking ship.”

“I’ll put Mitchell’s team on it. Let me know when you have news for me, Sam.”

“I will.”

~*~

“Jack?”

“Please tell me you have something for me, Lorne is set to have kittens down there on the Gate Room floor. I’ve never seen the man so rattled. He does not like having his systems disrupted.”

“Sorry, love, we should still evacuate to the mainland. But I think we might have found something.”

Rolling his eyes as he heard Lorne’s voice as he berated the marines down below, Jack replied, “All right. I was afraid of that. We called the Genii and as expected, they were sorry for our troubles, but unable to offer assistance in such a short span of time.”

“We’ll be up to explain as soon as we finalize a few details.”

“Details such as?”

“The exact amount of electricity we can run through the city walls. I’ll talk to you later, Jack.”

She’d learned quickly that she could get away with a lot more now than she could in the past, as far as explanations went. Jack wasn’t certain if it was because he was her husband now or if it was because she was no longer required to salute him. He hoped it was the latter.

Determining that the marines needed rescuing from the Major’s conniption, Jack wandered out to the rail and leaned on it. As he expected, his mere presence seemed to calm things down. He didn’t have to say a word. Sometimes, it was good to be the king, he thought, and smiled to himself.

~*~

“Mitchell, what’s your twenty?” Jack demanded as he eyed the last two dozen stragglers waiting for a pickup by a puddlejumper.

The radio crackled and Mitchell’s voice broke up as he replied, “…tle problem.”

“Say again, we’ve got interference from the storm.” Jack tapped his foot impatiently, he wanted these people off the city before Sam and Radek enacted their batshit crazy Ben Franklin and the kite idea.

“Can you hear me now, sir?” There was wind in the mike, but Jack could hear Mitchell better.

“Yeah, go ahead Mitchell, why aren’t you on your way back here?”

“I sent Sheppard and Markham with the jumpers, sir. We’ve got a problem with one of the scientists. He refuses to go into the caves and he’s having a meltdown and the marines aren’t handling it well. I’m on my way back up there now to see if I can sort it out. I’m just at the clearing now, oh, crap it’s Doctor Parrish from Botany.”

Jack gave a sigh; it wasn’t surprising that the botanist was having issues. He’d been buried alone in the ice for hours less than a year ago; it was enough to make anyone a bit claustrophobic. “Damn it. Tell the marines to stand down. I completely forgot about Parrish. Calm him down and keep him with you, tell him he doesn’t have to go in the caves, he can stay with the medical puddlejumper until it is absolutely necessary to get out of the weather. Go se to it.”

“Understood sir, Mitchell out.”

Jack tapped his radio again and informed his wife, “Sam, Mitchell isn’t coming back yet, you’ll need another runner.”

“Darn it, I was counting on him. I guess I’ll take that platform myself. I won’t ask you to run with your knee, Jack.”

He snorted, though he appreciated the out she was offering him. He wasn’t too proud to take it. “Oh, sure, blame my bum knee. I know you just don’t trust me to touch the technical wiry stuff.”

“That’s it exactly.”

Jack looked over at Chuck, who had volunteered to stay behind and man the Control Room consoles. “Hey Chuck, you up for a little running?”

“Sir?”

“Sam, I’m sending Chuck down to you. He’s a bright boy; you can explain the technical stuff to him.”

“Sounds good. Send Sheppard directly out to his platform when he gets back. Radek is staying here to monitor everything while Miko goes out to handle the furthest platform.”

That didn’t sit well with Jack. “You sent her all the way out there alone?”

“No, I sent Stackhouse with her.”

Jack rolled his eyes. “I sent Stackhouse to keep an eye on YOU, Samantha.”

There was a distinct note of irritation in her voice as she replied, “Tell ya what? I’ll keep an eye on me, you keep and eye on you, and we’ll let everyone else do their jobs, Jack.” She clicked the connection closed before he could reply.

The tech was watching him warily, so Jack snapped, “Chuck, go to the physics lab, see Doctor Carter.”

“Yes, sir…” Chuck eyed his consoles in confusion, having been well trained to never leave his post unattended.

“I can man a DHD and the communications panel, Chuck. I am not completely incompetent.”

“No sir!” Chuck replied and dashed away. He ran fast, Jack noticed as he watched him go. That was good, Sam needed a fast runner to get to the platform before the storm hit. A shame they didn’t have enough ATA positives to use the puddlejumpers to get to them, but the maneuvering would be tricky and not worth the risk.

As a puddlejumper lowered into the Gate Room Jack hit his radio asking, “Sheppard?”

“No sir, Lorne. Back for another group.”

“Good. How far behind you was Sheppard?”

The major had apparently been monitoring the comm channel; his voice drawled in reply, “I’m circling now, sir. Gonna let Markham land first, since he needs to load up and go. I’m supposed to stay and go see Doctor Carter.”

“She’s waiting for you. Be as quick as you can.”

“Don’t have to tell me twice sir, the wind is really kicking up out here, even with the inertial dampeners, we’ve had a rough ride. Uh, sir, we should probably requisition air-sick bags for future civilian evacuation operations.”

“I’ll take it under consideration, Major.”

“Landing in five, sir.”

~*~

Sam ran down the corridor towards the control room after disabling the relay at position two. They had determined that the Gate Room, including the Control Room would be safe from the electrical surge they were forcing through the city’s corridors. Miko had radioed that she and Stackhouse were on their way back. That meant two of the four relays were done. Chuck was en route, as was Sheppard. There was time, by their calculations. They were going to make it. Sam really hoped this worked.

 

The lights around the Gate suddenly flared to life and the activation sequence began to light. Tilting his head in confusion, since no one was off world, Jack watched the monitor for the IDC to show. The Genii’s trading IDC? “What the hell do they want?” He muttered and toggled the audio and said in a monotone, “Hello, you have reached Atlantis Control, due to weather conditions; we are not accepting visitors at this time. Please call again in a few days.”

“We have one of your scientists with us, Atlantis Control, he is injured. Please allow us to bring Doctor Corrigan home.”

Corrigan? They’d left him with AG-3 on PY7-332 negotiating for grain. How in the hell had the Genii gotten their hands on him? Jack toggled the shield control. “The shield is deactivated, you may come through.”

Jack expected to see farmers. He was shocked to see armed soldiers push a bound and gagged Doctor Corrigan through in front of them. Not injured, the anthropologist was a prisoner. Crap. Jack pulled his sidearm and ran towards the stairs, but the man at the front, an officer by the look and attitude, held a pistol to Corrigan’s head as he caught Jack’s eye. Letting his finger loose in the trigger guard, Jack held his hands up over his head, the Beretta dangling for the officer to clearly see.

His stomach dropped to his knees as twenty soldiers came through the Gate; the two marines had also put up their guns as soon as they saw that Corrigan was a hostage. Time for a little schmoozing. “Hi, look, maybe you didn’t get the message, but we have a bit of a situation here, it really isn’t a good time. Bad weather and all, you might want to come back when you can see the city in a better light.”

“This suits us fine. Put your weapons on the floor and kick them away. Now. Or I will shoot the Doctor.”

Corrigan looked at Jack desperately. “He’ll do it sir; he shot Abrams when Sergeant Langtree wouldn’t cooperate with him.”

“You shot one of my scientists?” Jack demanded as he reached the bottom step and kicked his service piece towards the leader. “That does not put me in a welcoming mood, Mister…?”

“Commander Koyla. I care nothing for your mood. We claim this city in the name of the Genii.”

Jack barked out a laugh and crossed his arms. “Too late, we called dibs. Go home, Commander Koyla.”

“I think not. Our sources tell us you do not have the manpower or resources to hold you claim at this time.” Koyla gave Jack a patronizing smirk. “You will be the ones leaving, I think, gather the remnants of your people and go.”

Throwing up his hands, Jack yelled, “This is ridiculous! The city is going to sink, unless my people can continue doing what they are doing to fix the shielding. Do you have scientists capable of that, Koyla?”

Koyla tossed his head in Jack’s direction and every Genii rifle and pistol in the room was simultaneously pointed at Jack. “I think we do now.”

“Shit.” Jack hated foothold situations.

“Your communications device please.” Koyla pointed to Jack’s earpiece. He tugged it off and pulled the base unit out of his pocket, handing both to Koyla, but not before he spun the dial to the open channel.

Under duress, AG-3 had likely shown Koyla how to work the comms. He slid it over his ear and clicked it on. “Attention, Atlantis Expedition personnel. This city is now under Genii control. You will congregate near the Gate immediately. Any interference with operations will result in the death of our hostages.” Koyla looked at Jack and demanded, “Your name?”

Thinking quickly, Jack came up with a combination of Spanish, Jaffa and a word he remembered from the Asgard, “Torli NadaCree.”

“I will start with the one that calls himself Torli NadaCree. You have fifteen minutes.”

Hopefully Sam got the message he was sending; not to listen to Koyla. Sheppard probably got it too. He didn’t know if Miko, Chuck, Stackhouse or Zelenka would understand. But Sam would. She’d tell the others, she’d coordinate things. If Teal’c hadn’t been over on the mainland holding down the fort for him there, he might have even cracked a smile at Jack’s code. It had been known to happen.

Sliding down to sit on the steps, Jack patted the step beside him for Corrigan to join him. Jack just needed to sit tight and wait for the shit to hit the fan… well, for more shit to hit the fan.

~*~

“Torli NadaCree? What the hell?” Sheppard was standing in the middle of the corridor just outside the Mess Hall. He’d raided the kitchen for an orange juice after his brisk run through the city after disabling his assigned station. The Genii were taking over? John snorted. Not likely. Obviously, O’Neill was sending a code.

John pulled out his radio and dialed it over to the Senior Staff channel. “Doctor Carter?”

“Sheppard, good.”

“What did he mean, Torli NadaCree?”

“Basically it translates to, ‘do not pay attention to me,’” Sam replied. “We’re on our own. Jack doesn’t want us to give in to this guy. We need to act quickly though, we’ve got less than an hour before the brunt of the electrical storm hits and we have to clear the corridors and get to the safety of the Gate Room.”

“I can get to the armory. If we can get to the jumper bay and open the doors, we could shoot down into the Gate Room,” Sheppard suggested as he started jogging towards the armory.

Sam sounded a little winded as she replied, “I don’t think they will be stupid enough to stay congregated in one place. I’ll contact the others; we’ll meet up in the puddlejumper furthest from the door. Stay down, don’t get caught, Sheppard. You’re the only one with the ATA gene loose in the city, since they have Jack.”

“Understood. Sheppard out.” You could take the Colonel off the name tag, but you couldn’t take the Colonel out of the girl, John smiled, glad the scientist was not panicking.

~*~

“Where are your people, Torli?”

It took Jack a moment to remember he was supposed to be Torli. “They probably got lost. Scientists can’t find their way out of a paper bag. No offense, Al.”

“None taken, sir,” Corrigan grinned. He’d whispered to Jack that AG-3 had been alive when he had seen them last, two of them were wounded, but they were alive. That had been a relief to Jack.

The sound of footfalls running towards the Gate Room drew everyone’s attention. Chuck skidded to a halt as he spotted half a dozen rifles pointed at him. He threw his hands in the air and stuttered, “Oh, hey, hi!”

“Where are the others?” Koyla demanded.

“Oh, you mean Doctor Cavalry? She’s a slow walker, bad hip and all. Poor old girl. She’s a coming, no worries. She’s on her way and will be here in a few minutes.”

Koyla raised his gun and pointed it at Chuck’s nose, causing the tech to gulp. “There is at least one other, according to AG-3’s information, where is the other person?”

“Uhmmm,” Chuck looked to Jack helplessly, this was not part of the hastily concocted plan.

“It’s okay, Chuck, I don’t wanna die today; the jig is up, tell the man where John is,” Jack picked the one most capable of defending himself, should Koyla send men after him.

“Oh, McCane, right, well, you know how he is, sir, he’s gone and holed himself up on Level Thirteen and refuses to come out.”

Level Thirteen was the designation the marines had given the Jumper Bay because the location didn’t appear on any of the transporter maps, like the 13th floor of most office building elevators; it didn’t seem to exist. So, it seemed that Sheppard was playing Die Hard. Good. Jack forced himself not to look up at the ceiling, in case Koyla’s people didn’t know about the drop floor in the jumper bay.

The Gate suddenly started to spin. Jack looked over at it and frowned as Koyla smiled. “Ah, reinforcements, right on schedule.”

Shit.

~*~

“Sam, the Gate just activated, is dialing,” Radek called from the hatch of the jumper. She was by the door, helping buckle Sheppard into a harness as he checked over her lines.

“Crap,” she mumbled, hurrying to finish buckling her TAC vest in place.

“Radek, do you have that remote access yet?” Sheppard asked as he ran to the jumper.

“Yes, Major. Why, what do you have in mind?”

“As the last chevron locks, turn the shield back on!” Sheppard barked and pointed at Radek’s laptop.

Radek blanched. “Major, that will kill anyone in transit, and anyone that does not know to turn back in time.”

“They shot Abrams; they are threatening to kill O’Neill. They plan to steal Atlantis out from under us. They need to be stopped. We have a chance with twenty of them, Radek. With more than that, the Genii will win. They will likely kill us. Reengage the shield. That is an order.” With Jack unable to give them orders, unlikely as it seemed, Sheppard had become the ranking officer.

Sam nodded her agreement when Zelenka looked to her for confirmation. Making an unhappy noise, Radek mumbled, “ _Do prede!_ ” under his breath as he waited for the proper timing of the dialing sequence. “Very well, Major Sheppard. It is done.”

~*~

“What just happened?!?” Koyla screamed as the shield engaged and flashes of light could be seen and the sound of impacts could be heard as Koyla’s people hit the Atlantis defenses.

Smiling, knowing that Sam and Radek had just happened, Jack figured it was time for action.

“Bugs on a bug zapper,” Jack drawled as he used both hands to shove at Corrigan, sending the scientist sliding across the Gate Room floor. Wisely, Al rolled until he hit the wall and kept his head down. With his hands still bound behind him, there was not much else the man could do.

Enraged, Koyla started barking commands into his radio, screaming at the advancing reinforcements to stop coming through the Gate and recalling his men that had spread out into Atlantis to the Gate Room.

Making a break fro freedom, Chuck attempted to run up the stairs, but was tackled by one of the Genii coming down from the upper level. They went down in a tangle of limbs, and the Genii came up first and slammed Chuck’s head down onto the floor, knocking the tech out.

The jumper bay iris suddenly opened and three armed, black-clad figures repelled down, taking aim and firing on the Genii soldiers as they ran around in confusion. Seeing what was happening, Koyla dove towards Jack, intent on regaining at least one of his hostages. The Genii commander ducked and rolled as Sheppard took aim at him. Coming up with his gun ready, he fired back towards the major. Sheppard was forced to take cover behind the Gate with Stackhouse as the remaining Genii came pouring back into the Gate Room.

Sam had released her line and dropped to the floor behind a fallen Genii interloper, using his body for a shield while she watched for an opening. She picked off a soldier that was creeping towards Stackhouse’s position.

“Cover fire,” Sheppard said into his mike.

Carter and Stackhouse started firing as Sheppard left his position behind the Gate and ran towards Corrigan, probably intending to drag the helpless scientist to safety. Sheppard didn’t make it, Koyla spotted him and fired four shots, catching him high on the chest and spinning him around with the impact of the bullets. He hit the wall hard and slid down to the floor, knocked out cold. Sam prayed that his vest had protected him, and was grateful the major had the foresight to grab vests for each of them from the armory.

Over by the stairs, the only coverage Jack had was a dead Genii soldier. He had to be dead. No one alive held their head at that angle. Hiding in the hallway leading to the Gate Room, Koyla was exchanging shots with Sergeant Stackhouse. It was only a matter of time before the Genii realized he had a clear shot at Jack from where he was and took action on that realization.

She was out of ammo for the P-90, tossing it aside; she checked the clip on Sheppard’s Beretta, borrowed back in the jumper bay for the occasion. Sam steeled her nerve and charged out towards Jack. She had a TAC vest on; he had only the dubious protection of a meat shield. She leveled the Beretta on Koyla’s position as she ran.

“Sam, no!” Jack shouted when he saw what she was doing. He waved her back. It was a long way across the Gate Room from where she had landed to the stairs. She wished Jack hadn’t cried out. It drew Koyla’s attention a few seconds earlier than her movement would have otherwise done.

She heard the whir of bullets flying around her as Koyla shot at her. Firing wildly; he was still keeping himself out of Stackhouse’s range. But even a wild shot gets lucky sometimes. Sam felt the burn an instant before she felt the pain explode in her thigh. The force of the shot spun her around, throwing her to the floor. Years of military training kicked in and she rolled with it, keeping her target in sight, firing at Koyla as he moved out into her line of fire. Unfortunately, it also put her directly in his. Her eyes met those of the cold killer across the distance.

One of them was going to die today.

He’d threatened to kill Jack. Sam fired, her finger squeezing the trigger until the sleeve was empty and there were no more rounds. There was a tugging at her TAC vest, the extra Beretta ammo clip being pulled free, and the gun was yanked from her fingers. Booted feet braced alongside her shoulders as another rain of bullets was fired across the Gate Room at Koyla.

Jack. Jack had come for her.

The Beretta clattered to the floor beside her head and Jack crouched down and peered anxiously into her face. “Sam? Sam baby, talk to me.” Jack’s fingers brushed her cheek.

“Ow. He got me.”

“We got him back. You nailed him, I finished him off.” Jack’s hands were running all over her body as he checked her for injuries. “I’m gonna roll you over sweetie, the bullet didn’t go through, I need to see where you’re hit.”

She nodded and whimpered in pain as he carefully lifted and turned her. He sucked in a breath as he caught sight of the wound on her upper thigh. Setting her down carefully, he rifled through the pockets of her TAC vest until he found a field dressing. “Good girl. Always prepared,” Jack muttered as he tore the wrapping open.

“Sheppard?” Sam tried to twist her head to look for their fallen man.

“Stackhouse and Chuck have him. They’ve got him out of his gear and it looks like his vest took the brunt of it; he’s probably just badly bruised and probably has a concussion from hitting his head on the wall.” Jack used his pocket knife to cut the fabric of her trousers away from the wound. He sucked another breath in wetly through his teeth as he checked the wound. “This is gonna hurt, the bullet is still in there. We’ll get you to the infirmary and…”

As Radek and Miko came towards them, Sam shook her head and clenched her teeth against the pain. “Can’t now, storm. Corridors not safe now.”

“Okay, okay. We’ll take care of it.”

Knowing him as well as she did, Sam could see that he was trying not to panic. She raised a hand and cupped his cheek, her touch hopefully soothing to him, or at least drawing his focus a bit. “I’ll be okay, Jack.”

“Damn it woman! You have got to stop jumping in front of me.” His eyes were a little glazed as he looked down at her and caressed her face again before moving to tend the wound. He glanced at her and said quietly, simply, “Please.”

“Okay.”

“Okay? You promise?”

“I promise Jack, no more jumping in front of you.”

“You’re lying to me to make me feel better; you’re never going to stop, are you?”

She smiled up at him as he tied off the pressure dressing, doing what he could with the supplies available. “Probably not.”

He sighed and pulled her up against him. He cradled her to his chest and rocked her slightly, “I love you, impossible woman.”

“Love you too Jack,” Sam whispered in reply as the city suddenly grew bright, every electrical circuit flooding as the storm hit and the electrical energy from the lightning was transferred down and through the city itself, channeling the energy needed to power the shields. Despite the brightness, darkness swam up and pulled Sam away.

 

 **~Epilogue~**

“Do you wish to play cards, Samantha?” Teal’c asked, waving a red and white packet at her as she looked over at him. “Laura Cadman has been teaching me to play Texas Hold ‘em.”

Jack groaned and shook his head, “That woman is a menace.”

Teal’c leveled a disapproving glance at Jack. “Laura Cadman is my teammate, O’Neill.”

“She’s still a menace. It’s her fault the Genii found out about the C-4.”

“And therefore the reason we have several months worth of tava beans in the larder, is it not?”

“Shut up and deal, Teal’c, Gin Rummy, not the Cadman version of whatever game she’s cheating at this week.”

Teal’c said nothing, but dealt three hands of Gin, Zelenka and Mitchell having declined to play and Daniel ignoring everyone as he read from his datapad. Sam wrinkled her nose at the hand she had been dealt.

“No one’s come out yet,” Mitchell said. He had not taken his eyes off the doors leading to the surgery since he’d arrived.

Reaching over to pat Mitchell’s arm, Radek said soothingly, “The preparation of the ancient machines takes long time, Cameron. Do not worry; Doctor Fraiser said she knows what has to be done. Is just small complication.”

Without looking away from his card, Jack said, “Minor surgery, Mitchell, Sheppard will be fine. Just a little displaced bone fragment.”

Chewing his lip, Mitchell nodded. “It’s still surgery.”

“With magical Ancient machines. Just look at what they did for Sam!” Jack waggled his fingers towards his wife, though he understood Mitchell’s concern. He’d been pacing the corridors yesterday while Sam had been under the knife and the Ancient voodoo gadgets Fraiser had used on her.

“Right,” Mitchell gave Sam a wavering smile and resumed his stare at the surgery doors.

When Teal’c discarded a three onto the pile Jack eyed it with interest, but his face fell as Sam slid her hand in under his and scooped up the whole pile. He frowned and complained, “I wanted that! You did it again.”

“It was my turn, Jack; I did not jump in front of you.” He scowled and she grinned triumphantly as she dropped down three sets of runs and then flipped her last card onto the pile. “Gin! I’m out!”

Mitchell suddenly pushed away from the wall, the motion drawing everyone’s attention. Doctor Fraiser was coming out of the surgery, and had a smile on her face which set everyone at ease. As she passed Cam, Fraiser patted his shoulder, “Your teammate is fine, Major. The surgery went as planned; you can all stop your worrying, and get out of my infirmary. I mean it, all of you, SG-1, out!” Fraiser waved her hands and there was a chorus of complaints and squeak of boots on tile as they all moved to comply.

“You too, General.”

Standing and stretching, Jack nodded and patted Sam’s hand. “I have some paperwork to do. I promised Lorne I’d finish it today.” Jack leaned over and pressed a kiss to Sam’s mouth. “I hate sleeping without you.”

“I’ll be home tomorrow, right Doctor?”

“Yes. I want her on another night of IV antibiotics just to be on the safe side.” Fraiser checked her IV line and then strode away, expecting her orders to be obeyed in her infirmary.

Caressing her cheek, Jack pressed his forehead to hers. “Love you. There, I said it first!”

“Love you too,” Sam smiled. “And I let you.”

The End.


End file.
